Eugene Fontinell - Self, God and Immortality

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SelJ

G o d ,

and

Immortality

A

junresiarl

I n v e s t ~ a t i o n



AMERICAN PHILOSOPHYERIES

I . K enne th Laine Ketner , ed. ,

Peirce u r d Contetrlyornry

Tllotcglrt: Philosophi-

cal

Irrquiries.

2. Max H. Fisch, ed. ,

Classic Arnen’can Philosophers: Peirce, James,

Royce,

Suntaynrza, Dewey, Wzitelteud. Second ech tion, with an int roduct ion

by

N athan Houser.

3. John

E. Smi th , Experience

and God.

Second edit ion.

4 . Vincent G . Potter , Peke’s PI~ilos~~phicaE

erxpectives.

Edi ted and with a

preface by Vincent

M.

Colapietro.

5. R i c h a r d E.

H a r t

and Douglas R. Anderson, eds., Philosophy in Exyeti-

etzce:

Anrerican

Philosophy

in

Trunsition.

6 . Vincent

G.

Potter, Charles S .

Peirce:

O n Norrrrs ntrd Ide a l s . Second edi-

t ion , wi th

a n

in t roduct ion

by

Stanley M. Harrison

7 .

Vincent

M.

Colapiet ro , ed., Rerrson,

Experietlce,

atzd God: h z E . Swrith

it1 DiaEcgrre. In t roduct ion by

Merold

Westphal.

8. RobertJ. O’Connell, s .J . ,

Wil l ia t~]nmes

n The Courage to Believe. Sec-

ond edi t ion.

9. Elizabeth K raus,

T h e Metnplzysics

c Exyevieme: A Corrymion

to

W j i t e -

head’s “Process

u ~ d

eality.”

S e c o n d e h t i o n , w i th

a

new in t roduct ion

b y R o b e r t

C.

Neville.

10.

Kenneth W estphal , ed. , Pvngmntisn~,RCCISOW,d Novnzs:

A

Realistic As-

resswent-Essays

it Critical

Appreciation

qf

Frederick

L . Will.

11, B eth J. Singer, Pmgrnntism, RightJ, utzd D e m c r a c y .



E U G E N E

F O N T I N E L L

SelJ

G o d ,

and

Immortality

A amesian Investigation

FORDHAM U N I V E R S I T Y PRESS NEW Y O R K 2 0 0 0



Copyright 000

by Fordham University Press

Au rights reserved

ISBN 0-8232-2070-2 (hardcover)

ISBN

0-8232-207 1-0

(paperback)

American Philosophy

Series,

no. 12

LC 00-037207

ISSN 1073-2764

Library

of

Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Fontinell, Eugene.

Self, G od , and immortality : a Jamesian investigation / Eugene Fontinell.

O r i g n d y published: Philadelpha :Temple University Press, 1986. With new pref

Includes bibliographical references and ndex.

ISB N 0-8232-2070-2 (hardcover

:

alk. paper)-ISBN 0-8232-2071-0

(pbk. : alk. paper)

1. James, W illiam,

1842-1910.-Contributions

in

imrnortalty.

2.

hmortahty-History ofdoctrines-20thcentury. I . Title. 11. Series.

B945.J24 66 2000

p. cm.- Am encan phdosophy series ; no. 12)

218-dc2 1 00-037207

Two poetry epigraphs arc used with the kind pennission of the publishers:

To Chapter 7 , from Ahce Walker, “Goodnight Wrllle Lee, I’ll See You in the Morning,”

Copyright 975 by Ahce Walker, from the book

Goodnight

Willie Lee, I’ll See You i n the

Monziq

by Ahce Walker. Rep rinted by permission

of

Doubleday Company, Inc.

To

Concludmg Reflections,

from

MariePonsot, “T he Great Dead,

Why

Not,

May

Know,”

from Admit Inzyedirnerrt by Marie Posnot,

0

by Marie Posnot, 1981, published by

Alfred

A.

Knopf

New

York.

T h e stanza fiom W.

€3.

Yeats

on

page 21 is

from

“The Song of the Happy Shepherd,”

from the Collected Poerns ofW.B. Yents, published in New York in 1956 by Macmillan, and

reprinted here with perrmssion. The lines

from

W e ’ s The Ninth Elegy on page 185

are

reprinted

from D~rirroElegies by

Rain er Maria Rdke, translated by

J. B.

Leishman and Ste-

phen Spender, with the pemussion

of

W. W. No rton Company, Inc. Copyright 1939 by

W . W. Norton P Company, Inc. Copyright renewed 1967 by Steph en Spender and J. B.

Leishman.



For

my

parents

Helen

and Ernest

and

m y nieces

Justine and

Flannery



This Page Intentionally Left Blank



Looking into Napo leon's eyes Prince

A ndr ew though t of

the

insignificancc of

greatness, the unimportance

of

life which

no o n e

could

understand, and the

still

greater

unimpor tance

of

death, thc m eaning

of which no

one

alive could understand or

explain.

" L e o

T o k t o y

War

a d Pm-e

The question of

immortality

is of its

na tu rc

not

a scholarly question.

It is

a question

wclling up

f rom the in te r ior which the

subject must put to itself as i t becomes

conscious

of

itself,

"Saren Kierkegaard

ConcEtrdirzg

Unscierzt$c Postscript



CONTENTS

PART

I

PERSONAL IMMORTALITY:

POSSIBILITY AND

CREDIBILITY

3 World or Reality

a s

“Fields” 25

2 Toward a

Field

Model o f t he Self 44

3

James: Toward

a

Field-Self 60

4 James: Personal Identity 81

5

James: F J ~elfand

Wider

Fields 101

6

James: Se and God 132

PART

I1

PERSONAL IMMORTALITY: DESIRABILITY AND EFFICACY

7

Immortality: Hope or Hindrance? 165

8 Immortality: A

Pragmatic-Prucessiue

Model 200

Concludirzg

ReJAectiotu

2

19

Notes 235

Index 289



R e adm g D o nne aga in ,

I’m

reminded I k n o w n o t h i n g

ab ou t de ath , no thin g save the one irrefutable fact :

I

will die.

And

that means that

I’m

bound to pro jec t

my sorry thoughts beyond death, cheerfully imagining

the self I ca l l

my own

as st i l l hve-though dead

of course to ev ery on e wh o kn ew me-jubil izing

w ith family and friends in a sunny field, hardIy m issing

a t all a missing God. It’s immortahty w e crave instead,

tha t museum

of

ten thousand

thngs

stockpiled beyond

our fleeting earthly hours. Sure,

we

keep on w ith talk

of

flesh

made

spirit,

but

Donne

already

k n e w

we

balk

at an y th n g less

than

ourselves , the oneground

of

aIl

o u r hopes no t God and eternity, that unseen end ,

but the self curled com fortably around itseif again.

R o b e r t Cordmg

“Reahng D o n n e “



PREFACE

TO THE FORDHAM

EDITION

As we begin a new millennium, we f ind ourselves in a s tr ikmgly s imilar

si tuat ion to the one in which WliliamJames delivered his Gifford Lectures

(190l-l902), published as The Varieties

of

Rellgio~rsExperience I / RE). As

“science” soars to new and bewildering heights of complexity articulated

in various and often confl ict ing modes of material ism, we are at the same

t ime inundated wi th

a

var iety and hv ers i ty of religious and “spirituality”

movements.’ Similarly, James found himself inwor ld of surging material-

istic claims for science a n d proliferating sp irituahstic an d parap sycholog cal

claims

and,

in th e last decade

of

his l i fe, the beginning of rel igous

funda-

rnentalrsm. W h de he wrest led to the end wi th the compet ing

nd

conflict-

in g calls of science, rel ig on , and parapsychology, he refused to sur render

his keen intellectual powers to dogm atic assertions in any of these areas.

E l ~ e w h e r e , . ~have characterized James’s philosophyof r e l i g o n

as

an effort

to avoid what might be called the “fallacy of false alternatives”: either

sci-

ence or rel igmn, ei ther reason or faith, either absolutely certain knowledge

or relat ivist ic skepticism, either un ch an gn g ob ject iv e values o r chaotically

changmg subject ive ones. Expressed more posi t ively: James makesn effort

to forge

3

“third alternative”

to

the then rationalistic and empirical versions

of

religion..‘

Since t h s essay, and I use “essay” pr im ad y in i t s verbal connotat ion, is

subtitled “AJamesian Invest igat ion,”

a

w o r d o n how

I

understand “James-

ian” and the

use

I

make ofJames

is

in o rder. Jam esian in the broad est ense

of the t e rm might be unders tood

as

“in the spirit ofJarnes.”AsJames of ten

&d, I d o not hesi ta te to dra w on o th er thmkers w he n I t h n k th ey w ill

serve my purpose. Hence , in ordero construct and advance my controll ing

hypothesis,

I

ut i l ize Dewey

and to

a lesse r ex t en t W hteh ead

as

weU as a

few phenomenologts ts and

a

number

of

other th inkers . Concern ing these

I m ake

of

James, I ear ly o n n ot e that I a m p r i m a d y c o n c e r n e d n o t t o

explicateJames’s metaphysics but rather to utilize his language and ideas, as

well

as

that

of

others,

“in

the development

of

a

‘self’

open

t o t hepossibility

x



of personal immortality.” Nevertheless, I pre sent an extensive explication

o f James’s views, because it

is

in James that

I

have found the r ichest re-

sources for constructing

a

m ode l of the

self

and God that renders belief in

persona l imm ortality plausible. It

is

necessary, therefore,

to

describe care-

fully

and in som e detai l several of James’s central doctrines

in

order to

show tha t they embody a subtlety, com plexity, and p lausibdity that

a

m o r e

superficial presentation of Jamesmisses. Since in these instances I am mak-

in g James’s do ctr in e my

own,

the establishment of the fundamental reason-

ableness of his doctrine reinforces mine.

IfJam es is to b e a resource rather than a weapon,

I

must consider those

aspects

of

h s thought that threaten as well

as

support my h ypothesis . For

exa m ple, it is necessary

to

deal wi th the content ion thatJames’s ph i losophy

of the self is properly interpreted

as

a materialistic

o r

“no-sel f” d octr ine.

Unless I can make a reasonable case for an alternative reading, my claimfor

the congeniahty of

a

Jamesian field-self o p e n to

personal

immortal i ty

is

serio usly un derm ine d. SiInilarly, by s how ing

that

the vie w of the self that

emerges in James’s later w ork s

is

consistent with the vie w in his earlier

Ptitrciyles of Psychology ( P P ) , hough m or e deve loped and r e f i ned ,

I

am si-

mu ltaneou sly show ing that there is

a

do ctrine of the self that is sensitive

and

responsive to “scientif ic,” “metaphysical ,” and “re l igo us” con cern s.

Such a v i ewf the self

must allow

for the real ity of uniq ue and cont inu ing

indwidual whi le avoiding both body-soul dual ism and atomis t ic indvidu-

ahsm. H e n c e , t h e b e d e v h g , c o nt ro v er te d , a n d e lu si ve q ue st io n

of

“per-

sonal

identity”

must

be tou ch ed up on . Finally, s ince no plausible belief in

immortahty

is possible

un less

the inc hid ua l self is related to and partially

consti tuted by

a

“w ider self ,” the reality, character, an d role of “G o d” must

be considered.

In those chap ters in wh ich ames’s thought receives detai led descript ion

and analysis , what

is

of pr imary impor tance is n ot w he the r I present a

fundamen tal ly correct interpretation

of

James-though I thnk I do-but

whether there emerges f rom my readmg ofJames , supplemented bynum -

ber

of

o th er th n ke rs , an intrinsical ly reasonable doctr ine

of

the self that is

o p e n to personal mmortality.This is the ust if icat ion for suchdetailed

considerat ion

of

the James texts. n fol lowing Jamesas he at tempts to af f i rm

a nondualistic selfw ith ou t fall ing in to materialism,

to

affirm personal iden-

t i ty while avoidmgany substantial-soul view, an d to

affirm

a God

who

does

no t hm inish the s ignif icance of individual human actions, we are engaged

in questions that are very m u ch alive. No claim, of course, is mad e that

these issues are definitively resolved by either Jame sr m e . T h e m o r e

mod-

est bu t

s t d

rather am bit ious claim is that by showing that there is i n J a m e s

a coherent and co nsistent philosophy of wo rld/real ity, self , an d G od , I am

simultaneously showing that there

s

available a necessary and indsp ensab le

framework

within which b el ief in immortahty can be exp lored and af-

firmed.



In an earl ier work, Toward

a

Rm?nstrr~t ion $Religion (TRR)

5

I suggested

ho w t ruth , rnorahty, God , an d rel igion m ight be envis ioned w i thin

a

r a d -

c d y process ive-relat iona l wor ld . In SeK God,

m d

Immortnlity

(SGI), he

v iew

of

God

presented earl ier s exten ded and, I hop e, enriche d, by relat ing

it to a processive-relational self and the po ssibility f and be lie f in and hop e

for personal immortihty. M y presupposit ions concerning two issues which

permeate S G I can, perhaps, be prepared for and reinforced by drawing o n

my t reatment of t h e m i n

TRR

and

a

pos t -SGI

essay.h

T he y are m etaphys-

ics/metaphysical assumptions and belief/faith.

The

me taphysics described and arg ued for in the first chapter of S G I

(“Wor ld or Reallty

as

‘Fields’ ”) can be labeled ei ther “f ield” o r “process-

ive-relational metaphysics”-“fields” be ing un de rsto od

as

“processive-re-

lational c ~ r n p l e x e ~ . ” ~t should be no ted a t the outset that affirmation of

the h n d of evolving or continually changing world/reali ty presented here

is not wedded to any particular version

of

Darwinism

or

particle physics

theory. I would maintain, howev er, that i t is compa tible with

and

i ndeed

reinforced by a variety f bo th .

Any theories that we are able to const ruct concerning the ch aracter of

theuniverse, he self, an d God must nsomefashionbederivedfrom

h u r n a n / p e r s o n a l e x p e r i e n ~ e . ~

egarlng

anyscientific

or

philosophical

theories that allegedly describe o r enable us to “understand” the changing

wo rld, unless w e f i rs t encountered “ change” in our “everyd ay lives,” it is

hard to see how such an unset t l ing not ion wou ld ever have been

postu-

lated.

Of

course, the real i ty of changeas not been the formidable problem

confronting humans in a l l ages an d cultures . Rather , it is w h e t h e r i n t h s

wildly changing wo r ld there are any unchang ing reaht ies or Reahty. In

the W est , dom inant canchdates for such, of cou rse, hav e been essences,

mathematical laws, values, and

God.

(Other cul tures have thei r own candi-

dates.)

In TRR (38fT.), & sti n pi sh ed “classical metaphysics” &om“con tem po-

rary m etaphysics” on the basis of the role assigned to processes and rela-

tions.” Classical metaphysics, of co urse , ack no wle dg es that the world we

experience involves processes and relat ions, but t h s is not the wh ole or

most impor tant par t of the s tory. “Under lying” these real i t iess a wor ld of

unch anging principles ultimately groun ded, at least for some thinkers, in

an unchanging God to whom w e are related b u t w h o has n o real relat ion

to

us.

l o

O n the other hand, there are a variety

of

“contemporary” meta-

physics, am ong wh ich I locate “pragmatism,” wktch h owever different in

their refined

details

agree in their rejection of any m o d e of on to logxa l o r

metaphysical duahsm. H ence , I would suggest hat , w M e b o th classical

and contemporary metaphysics acknow ledge the reality of processes and

relations, here is a ra&caI andsignificantdifferencebetween

a

“world

involving processes and relations” and a “w or ld

in

process and relational



th rough and through.” S C I is an effort to articulate the implications for

the self, God, a n d i m o r t a i i t y i n t he l atte r hnd of w or ld . ’

A n d t e rna t e w ay of descllbing James’s m etaphysics is as a “metaphysics

of

experience.” I will later describe the distinguishin g features

of

experi-

en ce as a transaction betw een diverse “fields” o r centers of activity.

So

unde rstood, experience or transactional activity constitutes d l existential

realities from electrons toGod. Here I s imply wish to note what experience

is not. It is not “m erely psychological .” Further , James rejects any m eta-

physical

dualism

w hich

would

assign e xpe rienc e to

a

subjective order of

being and reason to an objective order. Subject and object, subjective and

objective are derivative categories functionally distinguished from within

wider field

of

exper ience and/or real i ty .”

A

Jamesian metaphysics

of

expe-

rience, therefore, maintains that all claims ma de abo ut

reahty

or the wor ld

as a who le, as well as any cIaims m ade ab ou t God, must be ex trapolated

from

and evaluated in terms f

human

experience.

A

crucial implication of James’s reject ion of experience as merely psy-

chological, of course,

is

tha t re l igo us a nd /or myst ical exper iences cannot

be easily dismissed o r reductively explained away. It was reassuring

to

those

a m o n g us w h o are theis ts wh en

a

few years

ago

the Am erican Psyctuatric

Associat ion removed rel igous exper iences

from

its list

of

mental

disor-

Of course, o u r enthusiasm may be somewhat t empered when we

remember that i t comes almost one hundred

ears

afterJame s in his famous

Virieties

of

Religious Experience crit icized that “mechcal materialism [ w h c h ]

finishes up SaintPaulbycalhnghisvision on theroad

to

Damascus a

hscharging les ion of occipital cortex . . . [which] snuEs o ut Saint Theresa

as anhysteric,[and]SaintFrancis of Assisi

as

a hereditarydegenerate”

( V I E ,

20). The Psychiatric Association now acknow ledges that “mystical

experience

or

various

forms

of peak [or] t ranscendent exper iences” can

have positive consequences. This appears to be suppo r t ive of james’s con-

ten t ion concern ing uch

experiences:

“We

must not content ourselves wi th

superficial

rn ek ca l talk, bu t inquire into their frui ts

for

life” VRE,

2 7 ) .

Nei ther James nor the Association

is

saying that alleged religious experi-

ences

may

n o t be pa tho lo g~ ca l . W ha t ames is saying explici tly, and the

Association a t least implicitly,

is

tha t we cannot de te rmine the wor th of

such

experiences n

priori

butonly by a complexongoing procedure,

w her eby

we

a t tem pt to de te rm ine both the osi tive

and

the negat ive con-

sequences of these experiences for both the individu al and the

commu-

nity.

W h a t n o w a b o u tmy reference

to

“metaphysical assumptions”?

Why

n o t

“me taphysical principles”? Since the time of Kant, of course, there have

be en conflicts in wh ich one person’s absolutely certain first principles are

anoth er person ’s assum ptions. W hether they are called “assumptions” o r

“principles” is

of

l i t t le importance for

the

pragmatist as lon g

as

the lack of

absolutecertainty is ackn ow ledge d. Long before“foundationalism”be-



Pr&ce

to the

Fordhtlm Edition XV

came a nasty wo rd am ong

a

range of c ontempo rary thinkers , Jam es an d the

o th e r pragm atists had surrendered th e classical claims for certainty.15 O f

course, just because we are unable, whether in science, philosophy,r reli-

@on,

to

establish beyond a shadow

of

doubt those principles

and

beliefs

wh ich und erg rd all aspects of hu m an life does not mean that we cannot

make judgments concerning their worth and reasonableness. T h e dis tin-

guishing mark of “pragmatism,” howev er, is that , wh ile we can and must

construct the best abstract and conceptual argum ents possible, the decisive

feature of all claims are the “lived consequences” o r “fruits” that follow

from them . Fortuna tely, i t is n ot my present task to enter in to the

long-

running, cont inuing, and a t t imes bi t ter conf ic t over the ad equacy and

defens ibhty

of

t h s

feature of pragmatism.

I

will simply “assum e” it and

segue in to the other presupposi t ion refer red o above-belief/faith.

S G I does not claim that we can “know ” tha t G od exists an d tha t we

are

personally immortal.

What

i t does attempt to d o is to show that there can

be and argue

for

a “reasonable” belief in b ot h . T hi s takes us, of course,

into the long-running quest ions concerning the relat ion between fai th and

reason. N ot e that I say and no t or. To say the lat ter wo uld b e to

fall

i n to

o n e of those false chch otom ies m entioned abov e. Strictly spea km g, it w ould

be

more appropr iate

to

say the

dialectic

rather than simply “relation” be-

tween faith an d rea son in ord er o stress the d ynam ism

of

the relation. Not

only are there no belie& or fai ths uninfluenced by the character of the

believer’s reason, bu t the re is n o instance of human reason that is not in-

f luenced and indeed energized byaith-whether it is the faith of the envi-

ronmenta l i s t o r eco theologan concern ing whats ne ede d to save the earth

and hum ans f rom des t ruct ion, or Daniel Dennet t ’s belief that we will, in

the no t

too

&stan t future, create

computers

wi th consciousness inds t in-

guishable

from

human consciousness, or Ste ph en

Hawlung’s

belief that w e

wll

someday chscover the “Th eory of Everything.””

E1sewhere,I8 I co m m en ted on an art icle by the Ital ian philosopher Bat-

tis ta M ond in, enti t led “Fa ith and R e a s o n i n R o m a n C a t h o l ic T h o u g h t

from C lem en t of Alexandria to Vatican 11.” He based his article on the

following

premise: “The famous formula expressing the

Roman

Cathol ic

pos i t ion concerning the problem

of

the relation between fai th and reason

is: j d e s

now

destwit sed p e @ d

r&new.’’14

C o m m ent in g on th is,

I

state that

it teUs

only

half the story and is misleadmg unless combined with

a

mirror

claim: reason does n o t destroy b u t perfects faith. Unless these

two

claims

are held in existential as

well as

reflective tension, the t endency will b e

to

aff’rrm o n e pole of th e chalectic at the expense of the other. This is not to

deny, how ever, that existentially and psychological ly we a re, for the most

part, believers before we are kno wers. In a letter to Helen K eller, James

wro te : “The grea t wor ld , the bnckground, in

al l

of us, is the world of our

beliefs.”20T h a t such a view is expressed by James s not surprising, but

it

is

also

shared

by

the more “rationalistic”

Whitehead,

who

tells

us

tha t “we



philosophize because w e believe; we d o n o t believe because w e philoso-

phize. Philosop hy is a criticism of belief-preserving, dee pe ning , an d

mod-

i fying i t .”?’ Re aders w i l l, of co urse , recognize this

s

a conternporar)r ec ho

of

the t rad t ion al “faith seeking understandmg.”

O n e fur ther po in t concern ing the charac te rf “faith” o r “ be lie f” w h c h

underglrds SGk R el ig ou s bel ie f, part icu larly bel ie f in im m o r t a h yhas fre-

qu en tly bee n charged-most dramatically by Nietzsch e as w e shall later

see-with be ing escapist o r

a

means to superficial consolation.

I

wiIl argue,

to

the contrary, that belief in immortality/resurrection has the possibility of

deepen ing , enr ichng , and energ iz ing

our

efforts and life in th e “h ere and

now .”

T h e cent ra l and cont ro l ling ques t ion posed and responded

o

i n

S G I

is:

Can

w e w h o ave been touched y the intellectual and exper ient ia l revolu-

t ions o f th e co nte m po rary wo r ld still believe wi th a degree of coher ence

and cons is tency that we s individual persons are immortal?

A

key assump-

t i on of t h s essay is that the grad ual eros ion f belief in personal immo rtali ty

over the

last

several hu nd red years is b ou nd up with the collapse

of

the

dominant metaphysics of Western culture. This metaphysics , which

I

have

designa ted abov e as “classical,” co m bin ed a philosophy of the self as co m -

posed

of

sou l an d body-the latter being ma terial

and

subject to

dissolu-

t ion, nd he orm er pir i tual nd essential ly, tho ug hnot necessanly,

indmoluble-with a philosophy

of

an immutable, al l-knowing, al l-power-

f d

God w h o sends the immortal

soul,

after a period

of

testing in the moral

arena of “this wor ld ,” to e i ther e ternal heaven or e ternal hel l (wi thpossi-

ble s top along the way

to

the former in pu rga tory) .

This

v iew of the self

and G o d , along w i th

the

metaphysics in whch it is grounded-absolute

an d un ch an g in g essences, values, principles, an d laws-has b ee n assaulted

and

underm ined, though not def ini t ively drsproved,

by

a

drversity

of

sci-

ences and phdosophies.

In

addition, i t has become increasingly uncongenial

to the exper ience of a variety

of

persons, incluchng a num ber

who

v iew

themselves as rel igously con cerned .

This

situation

has

g v e n r ise

to a

variety and cbversity of responses. At

o n e e n dof the spect rum are those who cons ider the ques t ion

f

irnmortal-

ity closed. T h e m ost ext reme express ion

of

t h s denial of immortality, and

some

would

say the

most

consistent, is

that of

nihh sm -the total dismissal

of all

meaning, s ince “meaning” was int imately and inseparably bound up

w ith fa ith in

God

and im m or t ahy . The r e a re o the rs w ho , while deny ing

tha t G od and personal immortality are any longer l ive op t ions ,

s t d

strive

to

affirm meaning, though in com pletely imrnanent is tic and hum anis t ic

terms-thus various mod es of secular hum anism , In recent years there has

emerged a small b u t d r s t i n p s h e d g r o u pof thnkers f rom wi th in the major

r e l i gous t r ad t i ons

who

reject personal imm ortality b u t retain faith in God

and the impor tance of religrous activity, and endeavor to express meaning

in those t e rn s .



Preface

f o the Fordham Editiotr x v i i

At the o ther end of the spect rum are those who s tdl bel ieve in personal

immo rtali ty and the meaning of whose lives is tied to t h s be li ef . Som e of

these imply accept inlmortahtyblindly ndunquestioningly.Others,

w he the r in sophisticated

or

unsophist icated form, retain the o lder meta-

physicsdescribedaboveand ind n o existential or intellectualconfhct.

There a re a few, however , who, aware of theproblems accompanying

trahtional metaphysics , endeavor to be responsive

to

con tem por a r y rejec-

tions of dualism, an absolutely imm utable and transcendent God, and a

m o d e of imortahty belief that is tho ug ht to diminish the s ignificance of

the present l ife. The se last, for the most part , are led merely to juxtapose

their bel ief in imm ortahty with their acce ptance of these contemporary

views.

T he re is,

I

believe,

a

great need at the present t ime fordialogue involv-

ing viewpoints that

affirm

and question personal

immortali ty.

These view-

pointsmaybe ocated ndlfferentpersons or, t o some exten tbutnot

equa lly, within the same person, as they are in my case . Wi thout such

a

& d o p e , the impor tan t l iab il it ies and possibht ies of both the aff irmation

and the denial

of

personal inmortalrty will n o t be faced adequately. T his

can result

only

i n a con t inued t hnn ing and f l a t t en ing ut of the beliefs of

those

on

b ot h s ides

of

the quest ion . O ne im po r tan t hase

of

such

a

h a l o p e

w d be reflective or speculative considerations of the implications of either

belief in or denial

of

personal immortality. Since it is usually m o re fruitful,

initially a t least, to explore a question from o ne perspective,

I

have cho-

s e n d v i d e d t hough I am-to appro ach the question from the sideof one

w h o affrrms personal

immortality.

My

essay is dwided in to

two

parts, b oth con cer ne d w i th personal im-

mortality: the first part, “Possibility and Credibility,” indirectly;he second,

“D es i r ab hy an d E fficacy,”

dmctly.

I

contend that these

two

cfistinct b u t

not separate aspectsof immortahty bel ief belong together and that thewo

parts

of

the

essay,

w he n read w hole, reinforce each other . I ts crucial first o

establish as “reasonable” the doctrines of a processive-relational or “field”

metaphysics that allows

for

a

c odn r r i t y of

narrower and wider dimensions

of

one

wor ld , of a holistic self that avoids b o th an unacceptable dualism

and

a

reductionistic rnateriahsm, and of

a

God in t imate ly and ex i s ten t idy

inter twin ed w ith hu m an lives. Unless t h s is done, the claims that immor-

tality be lief is

not

escapist,

that

it drec t s h u m a n m e r g e s t o w a r d r a t h e r t h a n

div em ng the m from the crucial tasks confron t ing us here and now, that

such a belief is not an expression of

a n

out-moded soul-doctr ine, and that

w e are cooperatively acting with God in the universal creative rocess-all

such

claimsare reduced

to

mere pious assert ions.

An

impor tantconse-

quence , then ,

of my consider ing immortahty belief w i t h n the process ive-

relational view

of

the

seK

and God is that such belief plays

a

significantly

different role within t h s v ie w t ha n i t d o es w i th in t he t r d t i o n a l v i e w o f

self

and

God.

In

sum,

the doctrines developed in the first part

of

the

essay



glve dep th and s uppor t to the extrapolations advanced in the secon d part;

and the extrapolations presented in the second part g v e specif ic ity and

concreteness to the doctr ines developed in the f i rs t art.

O n e

final

poin t : though

I

have argued for the viabil ity

of

belief

in

per-

sonal immortality,

1

have made n o effort to mask or sugarcoat those features

of hum an exper ience that threaten or t end to undermine such belief . In-

deed ,

I

have endeavo red to present

as

strongly as I could what I consider

the m or e serious objections to t h s bel ief . These object ions are not m erely

abstract o r “inteUectual” bu t co nc ret e and existential. T he y pervade the

thought

and

experience

of

any ref lect ive con temporary believer, and there

are

no

absolutely com pell ing argum ents I

know

of that

can

completely

ove r com e them .

Thus ,

particularly in the second part

of

the essay,

a

num -

ber of the speculations are quite tentative and characterized by a degree of

incom pleteness. This is consistent, however, w i t h a central claim of the

essay, w h ic h is that belief in perso nal immortality for those consciou s of

and sensitive to the ds t inguishing features f the contemporary wor ldnev-

i tably and inescapably involves unresolved and perhaps unresolvable

ten-

sions.??

NOTES

1. It should

be

noted a t the outset that it is not only theists and philosophers

who

have deep and a t times acerbic disagreements. Similar conflicts

can

be

found

am ong contemporary D arwinists, whether biologists, paleontologxts, or cognitive

scientists, in spite of their shared metaphysical materiahsm.An indication

of

such

conflicts can

be

gleaned

from

two articles

by

Stephen Jay

Gould, followed

by a n

exchange of letters in the N ew

h r k Review

ofBooks (“Darwinian F udam entalism,”

6/12/97,

pp. 34-37; “Evolution: T he Pleasure of Plurahsm,” 6/26/97, pp. 47-52;

“Evolutionary Psychology: An Exchange,” 10/9/97, pp.

55-58).

Regarding cog-

nitive scientists’ conflicts,

the

one noted in

Self; Gad, and ImmorfaIify

( S C I )

(246

n .

9)

between Daniel Dennett and John Searle, continues and intensifies. (See New

York

Review

c$’Booh, 12/21/97, pp. 83-85.)

2. George Johnson’ssplendid work, Firen the Mind: Science,

Faith,

and the

Searchfur Order ( F I M ) (New

York:

Vintage Books, 1995), might be said to

present

us with a “metaphor” of the contemporary situation concerning science(s) and

religion(s). Northern New Mexico is the site of the atom-bomb-era Tech Areas of

Los Alamos and the present National Laboratory

as

well as

the

Santa Fe Institute

which “has become the center

of

search

for

laws

of

complexity, which seek

to

explain how our unfeeling universe gves rise to life, mind, and society” ( 3 ) . nter-

woven with

or,

more accurately, juxtaposed to these cutting-edge science labora-

tories and scientists are communities of Tewa and other

pueblo

Indians, regularly

practicing their r i t es anddances; a varietyofAnglo and

Hispanic

Christian

churches and sects; and a diversity of New

Age followers,

believers, and prac-

titioners.

3 . Eugene Fontinell, “James: Religion

and

Inclrviduality,” in Classical Anrericun

Prupmtistn: Its Conteempurury

t.‘itality,

ed.

Sandra Rosenthal, Carl R. Hausman, and

Douglas

R.

Anderson (Urbana: University

of

Illinois

Press,

1999),

146-59.



4. Cf. The tt’ill tu Believe

(W B ,

178), where James is critical

of

those w riters

who “have no imagnation of alternatives. W ith them there is no tertitrtn p j d

between environm ent and miracle.

Arrt

Crlesm-, atrt d l r r s Arrt Spencerism, nu t

catechism ” George Johnson’s F l M , cited above, might serve as an example

of

a

contemporary

effort

to

forge

a

“third alternative.” Early on he tells us that he takes

an “agnostic stanc e-betw een the extremes of science as discovery and science as

construction” (6). Later, he asks: “C an we find a middle g round between these

tw o extremes-[the Platonists and the cultural constructivists]-a way to separate

the patternswestamp

on

realityfrom the patterns that realitystamps on our

minds?” John son then makes a suggestion that I find congenial to the transactional

metaphysics hat is presented

in

S G I . “Perhaps,” hesuggests, “th e patterns we

discern are neither universal nor arbitrary, but the result of the interaction between

our

nervous

system

and

some

h n d

of

real world”

(324).

5.

(N ew York: Doubleday,

1970;

repr. New York: Cross

Currents,

1980).

6. “Faith and Metaphysics Revisited,” Cross Crrrretlts (Sunmer

1988).

128fE

7.

A

creative theory

of

“fields” is to be found in the writings of the biochem ist

Rupert Sheldrake, Rebirth of Nl~trrre: I e Greening oj- Science and God (N ew York:

Bantam Books,

1991).

Sheldrake proposes what he designates a “hypothesis of

formative causation” which “suggests that self-organizing systems a t all levels of

complexity-includmg molecules, crystals, cells, tissues, organisms, and societies

of organisms-are organized by ‘morphic fields.’ ” Sheldrake contends that “the

way

past hemoglobin molecules, penicdlin crystals,

or

giraffes influence the mor-

phic fields of present ones depends on a process called mwplzic resonance. the influ-

ence of l i k e

upon

like through spaceand time.” He goes on to say that “this

hypothesis enables the regularities of nature to be governed

by

habits inherited by

morphic resonance, rather than by eternal, non-material, and non-energetic laws”

8.

Cf. John J. McDermott, 77w Culture

$Experience

(Ne w York: New York

University

Press,

1976), 110:“T he impact ofjames’s philosophy

is

that an analysis

of hum an activity turns ou t to be an ‘ultimate’ metaphysics, or there is no reality

to he

hscussed

apart

from

our participation and formulation.”

9.

When I made my “metaphysical m ove” years ago,

I

did not then,

nor

do I

now, have any dus ions concerning my or anyone else’s ability to refute “classical

metaphysics.” Indeed, I believed at the time,

and

my belief has been borne out,

that there would con tinue to emerge new, sophisticated, and formidable articula-

tions within science, philosophy, and theology that would utilize arid enrich many

if

not all of the basic claims associated with such metaphysics. The persistence/

resurgence of “Platonism” am ong mathematicians,physicists,andphilosophers

supports

m y

belief. O n e

of

the most impressive manifestations

of

the viability

of

“Platonism ” can be found in the works of the analytic philosopher Thomas Nagel.

See, forexample

T7w

Last

Word (New

York: Oxford UniversityPress, 1997).

Nagel, whom I later cite

as

a n

exponent of the “absurd” (SGI, 277, n.

S 7 ) ,

does

not hesitate to assert that the “last word” is “truth.” He contends that “whoever

appeals to reason purports to discover a source

of

authority within

himself

that is

no t merely

personal,

or societal, but universal. .

.

.,’

He

goes on to say that “if

t h s

description sounds C ar t e s i m

or

even Platonic, that is

no

accident” 3-4). NageI’s

belief in objective truth, however, does not lead him to believe in o r

even

desire

the existence

of

God.

In

a

strihngly

honest

and direct description

of

his

position

(110-11).



xs Pr@ce to the Fordlram Editiotl

on the God-question, Nagel states: “I want atheism to be true and I am made

uneasy by the fact that

some

of the most intelhgent and well-informed people I

kn ow are religous believers. It isn’t just that

I

don’t believe in God and, naturally,

hope

I’m

right in my belief.

It’s

that I hope that there is no God I don’t want

there

to

be a

God; 1

don’t want the universe

to

be like that”

( 1

30).

10.

Cf.

The Basil Writings qf St . Tltontas Aqninas, ed. Anton C. Pegs, 2 vols.

(Ne w York: Ran do m House. 1945),

1:283).

Aquinas states: “As the creature pro-

ceeds from God in diversity of nature, God is outside of the whole creation, nor

does any relation to the creature arise from His nature; for He does not produce

the creature

by

necessity of

His

nature, but by His intellectand

will

. .

.

Therefore,

there is

no real

relation in God

to

the creature, whereas in creatures there is a real

re la t ion to God; because creatures are contained under the d ivine order, and their

very nature entails dependence

OR

God”

(emphasis added).

11. For an example of

a

recent imagmative, provocative, and controversial ef-

fort

to rethink theology within a radically processive-relational world , see Diar-

muid 0 MurchG, Qunnt t r r - n

Theology

{New York: The CrossroadPublishing

Company,

1997).

Th ree short texts will give hint of perspectives presentedby

0

M u rc h k “In m od em physics the image of the universe

as

a machne has been

transcended by the alternative perception of an indivisible, dynamicwhole whose

parts are essentially interrelatedand can be understood only as patterns of a cosmic

process” (35 -36) . “W e humans arenot themasters

of

creation ; w e are participators

in

a

co-creative process that is

much

greater than

us

and

probably quite capable

of

getting along w ithout us

.

. .”

( 3 3 ) . I

suggest that the doctrine of the Trinity is an

attempted expression

of

the fact that the essential nature of God is about relatedness

and th e capacity to relate, that the propensity to relate is, in fact, the very essence

of God”

(82).

As an example of how two thinkers, both Christians and well-schooled in the

claims of contemporary physics

and

cosmology can arrive

a t

radically opposing

theo logc al conclusions, contrast 0 Murchu’s work with that of Fred Heeren’s

Sltotu

M e

God (Wheeling, Ill.: Day Star Publications, 1998).

0

Murchd states: “It

no w appears that the

‘once-for-aU

process’

is

only utle of a

number

of

evolutionary

cycles, in a universe that may be trihons rather than bdions

of

years old” (183).

H e

aIso

maintains “that the entire Bible, aiong

with

the sacred texts of other reli-

gions,

is first and foremost a story, and not a record of definite facts

and

events”

(1

14). Heeren, on the other hand, accepts the

“big

bang” theory as conclusive,

thereby establishing that the universe

had a

begmning. Further, “a universe with a

beginning requires

a

Begmner, . . pointing most naturally to a C reator that exists

outs ide

the universe” (xvii; emphasis added). Heeren also argues in this volume,

and he

intends to

argue in three m ore volumes, that “H ebrew revelation

is

the

only religious source com ing

to

us from ancient times that fits the modern cosmo-

logcal

picture. And in many cases, 20th-century archaeologists and myth experts

have also been forced to turn from older views that treated the Bible

as

myth to

ones that treat it

as

history” (-y.).

12.

Cf James,

Essays

irz

R a d i c a l Empiticism

( E R E ,

271):

“ 7 I e

attributes ‘strbject’

and ‘object’ t n e a n , t h m , a procticnl

distinctiun

qf the utmost itqmrtunce, btrt a distinction

udlich is o a FUNCTIONAL order

only,

and lzot a t

all

ontolugicul m understood

by

cllssical dualism.’

13.

New

York

Tirrrex,

2/10/94,

p-

A16.



14.

Far an insightful t reatment of James’s “ph losophy of my sticism’’ and its

sinlrlarity and dissirmlarity to current “cons tructivist” views, see G . W llliam Bar-

nard , Exploring

Unseen

U’orids:

W i l l i m J t m e s and

the PIzilosoplzy ofhdysticism (Albany:

State Universi ty

of

N e w

York

Press,

1997).

Barnard

dso

makes

creative

use

of the

“fie lds withm fie lds” metaphor which

i s

t he cen te r and g round f the speculations

presented in SG I .

15. Cf. P a u l J e r o m e Cr o c e , cience arid

Religiotl

irl the Era c?f WilliartiJames: Eclipse

qf

Certainty, 1820- 2 880 (Chape l Hill: Universi ty of North Carol ina Press ,

1995),

vol.

I.

Croce proposes “ tha t

on

issues relating

to

the in te rsec t ion

of

science and

religion,

the middle to la te n ine teenth century is the era of Willianl James.” H e

goes

on

to

say

that “Volume 1 is abou t Jam es a nd his circle in con text of certainty

just entering an ecl ipse . Volum e I I w d cover James’s early adulthood and the

formula t ion

of

answers

to

u n c e r t a i n t y - a n d o f

a

template

for

twent ie th-century

intellectual life” x-xi). Given the quality

of

v o l u m e I , the second volume is ea-

gerly awaited.

16. T h e need

to show

that faith and

reason

are distinct but related and reconcil-

able dimension s of human be ings has been a Qstinguishing feature of

my

own

re l igous comm uni ty , Roman C a tho li c i sm, f rom the t ime of C l e m e n t of Alexan-

dria to the present . I t was

on ly a

few years

ago

tha t Pope John Paul 11

issued

an

encyclical

on

this quest ion. Of course, at

no

t h e , u p to and including the present ,

has the re bee n u nan imo us ag reem en t n the character of the faith-reason relation.

As is qui teevident ,however , he went ie th-centuryradica lrevolu t ions n

our

understanding of “reason” havehadformidable consequencesfor here levant

speculations, similar o but perhaps more profound and sure ly more unse t t l ing than

the changes that ensued

pon the

emergence of h i s t o t e l i a n i s m in the High Middle

Ages.

17.

For

a s t r i h n g a c k n o w l e d g m e n t

of

such foundational “fa i th” expressionso n

the par t of a distinguished scientist , see c h a r d Lewont in’s rev iew of Carl Sagan’s

The Denlon-Harcnted I.Vorld: Sciena ns a Candle in the Dark New

KJrk

Rewicw

of

Books,

1/9/97,

pp .

28-32).

Two tex t s

wdl

ind ica te the thrust of Lewont in’s

cr i -

t iqu e: “T he case for thescient if icmethodshould tse lfbe‘scient if ic’andnot

merely rhetorical. Unfortunately, the argum ent may no t

look

as good to the un-

convinced as it does to the bel ievers” (29); “ O u r w d h n g n e s s to accept scientific

claims

that

are against common sense

is

the key to understanding of the real strug-

gle

between science and the supernatural . We take the side of science

in

spite of

the patent absurdi tyof some of its constructs, in

spite

of i ts failure to fulfill m a n y of

i ts extravagant p romises of health and Jife, in spite of the tolerance

of

the scient if ic

community for unsubstant ia ted stones, because we

have

a prior c o m m i t m e n t , a

cornrni trnerl t to materia l ism”

(3

1)-

18. “Faith and M etaphysics Revisi ted,” noted above.

19. Dialogue

G AIliance,

I, No.1. (Spring 1987),

18.

20. Ci t e d i n Ra l p h Ba r t o n Perry, The Tl2ought

and

Chnruc.fero M’iiliamJ~mts, 2

vols. (Boston: Lit t le , Brow n and Company, 1935)II:455.

21 Alfred North W hi tehead , “The H arva rd Lec tu res for the Fall of 1926,”

cited

in

Lewis

S.

Ford,

7 7 r P

Enrergeme of Wlritchend’s

Metuplrysics,

1925- 1929

(Al-

bany: State Universi ty of N e w York Press, 1984), 309. Perhaps even more surpris-

i n g t h a n W h i t e h e a d ’ s a e r m a t i o n

f

the foundational role of belief is the follow ing

text

of

Nietzsche’s:

“a

‘faith’ mu st be there first

of

all

so

that science can acquire



f rom i t a direc t ion , a meaning ,a limit,

a

m e t h o d , a right to exist” (Friedrich Nietz-

sche, Otr the Gerlenlogy o Mortzls t rans. Walter Kautinann

and

R. J .

Hollingdale

[ N e w York: Vintage Books, 19693,

151-52).

22. I

believe hat heprocessive-relational o r “field”metaphysicsand

my

hypotheses concerning the self, G od , an d i~nmortality resented in S G I are reason-

ably

consistent with the b n d of world sug gested, direct ly and indirect ly ,

by

the

various sciences. This consistency

(or

perhaps lack

of

significa nt incon sistency ) is

more p re supposed than

formalIy

argued for but is frequently noted and touched

upon. For an example of work tha t dea ls more d i rec t ly wi th the re l ig ion-sc ience

rela t ion and in which there are both convergences with and divergences

iom

S C I ,

s ee J o h n P o l l u n g h o m e , 77w Faith

rf n

Phyricist: R@ections c r f

a

Bottom-Up

Tltinker

(M inneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996). I have already noted and wil l develop more

fui ly in the body

of

the tex t

James’s

insistence that

al l

speculat ions concerning

realityand God must be der ived f rom hum an exper ience . He is, there fore , in

Pol lunghome’s t e rmino logy , a “ B o t t o m - U p ” t h n k e r . T h e well-real ized intent ion

of Pol lunghome’s

work is to

show the com patibi l i ty with, and in

some

instances

theenhancemen t of, Christiandoctrines by conte mp oraryphysics.“Ult imate

hope ,” however , cannot be rea l ized through a world devoid of a “sav ing” God , a

G od w hi ch physics a lone can never reveal . This ast conte ntion, how ever differen t

in deta i ls , and from

a

philosophical rather than a theological perspective, is the

central claim of SGI-no God, no iumlor ta l i ty-no inmlor td i ty , no trltirrmfe hope

I o p e n e d

by

suggest ing that we find ourselves in

a

situation similar

to

the one

James found h im se l f in

at

the turn of the last cen tury as regards the re la t ion(s)

be tween “ re l igon” and “ sc ience .”

For

a direct and accessible presentat ion of h o w

diverse and confl ic t ing twentie th-century scient ists can be when confron ted with

questions and

problems concerning the re la t ion between religon and science, see

Comas, Bios,

Tlleos, ed .

Henry

Margenau and Ro y Ab raham Varghese (La Salle,

Ill

Open Court, 1992). In addi t ion to a

series

of interviews w ith thirty scientists.

there is included a deba te be tween

two

formidable analyt ic philosophers, H.

D.

Lewis and An thony

Flew,

on

the rational necessity

for

God.

Again, this debate

is

inchcative of how a con t roversy t akmg on new u rgency du r ing the t ime

ofJames

contin ues and rem ains unre solve d to the present- just, James would add, as i t

should and wi l l cont inue

to

be .



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I f one of the central claims of this essay is valid, then I m u s t acknowledgc a

debt to everyone wi t h w ho m I have bcen related i n a n y way, since who

we

arc as individual persons

is

inseparable from a multiplicity

a n d

diversity of

relations, past and present. Of course, no t a l l thc relations that ente r into the

constitution

of

our selves are cqually important. Hencc

I

ow e a special debt

to

a num ber of f riends who, over the

years,

directly and indirectIy, con-

sciously and unconsciously, have in varying degrees contributed to the for-

mation of whatever reflective life I may

possess.

M y

oldest

professional debt is

to

the late Ro bert Pollock, w ho intro du ced

m e to W iiliamJarnes and Am erican p hilosophy many years ago at

Fordham

Universi ty. W hether teaching medieval , m od er n, o r A merican philosophy,

Pollock possessed

a

gcnius for or ient inghis students

to

the living features of

thinkers within these periods.

M y

o w n efforts to teach Jame s have benefited

from the ques t ioning

nd

criticisms

of

m y s tudents

at Queens

Collcge,

C i ty

University of New York. Over m an y years and in different ways, m y col-

leagues in thcPhi losophy Dcparttnent have been responsible, of ten un-

know ingly, for my thinking and rethinking m any of the issucs

with

which

this wo rk is concerned.

Th ree friends of lo ng st an din g have bcen continually and crucially sup-

portive.

Joseph

Cu n n een w ho, w i th

his

wife Sally C un ne en , has edited the

journa l

Cross

Cwrenfs

for

more

than

thirty-five

years , encouraged

me

a t

the

earliest stage of the project.

Versions

of Chapter s

7

and

8

appeared as articles

in

Cross

Cuvrentr ( Sum m er 1981; Spring

1982).

Th os e art icles and the scc-

tions

of

this

book

that incorp orate the m we re edited creatively

by

William

Birm ingh am . He also read an early, very rough draft of the manuscr ipt and

made suggestions for i ts organizat ion and developm ent that were of ines-

timable value.

M y debt toJohnJ. McDermott is threefold. Firs t , I am in debt to him, as

are

all

s tudents

of

William

James,

for

his comprehensive edition

ofJames’s

xxlii



XXiV Ackrrowledgrrtrrlts

writings (The

Writings qf

Wil l innrJmes, N e w Y ork: R a n d o m H o u s e ,

1967),

which appeared almost

a

decade before the first

volumes

of the

superb

Ha wa rd Un ivers i ty Press edi t ion ofJames’s works . Second, both th rough

his

essays and perso nal com mu nication s over the years ,

I

have been led to

ever new appreciat ion of the range and subt le ty ofJames’s thought .inally,

McDermott’s cr i t icismsof m y views, even when they weren conf l ic t wi th

his ow n, w er e always construc tive and aime d at helping

me

give hese

views heirstrongestarticulation-withneveranattempt to urn hem

toward his own concerns .

Everyone

at

Temple Univers ity Press wi th w ho m I had dealings during

the product ion

of

the first edition was both exceptionally gracious and

invariably helpful.

I

must , however ,

single

o ut several persons. Jane C uIlen,

senior aquis it ions edtor , reviewe d the man uscr ipt in

a

rough, unf inished

form

a t a t ime whe n

I

had set i t aside beca use

of

other concerns . Her

recogni t ion of i ts possibilit ies and e nthusiastic supp ort an d enco uragem ent

gave me the impetus to br ing the project to c losure . Mary D enma n

Ca-

pouya, product ion edi tor , cont inual ly keptme informed of the myriad de-

tails conn ected with turning

a

manuscr ip t in to book and gent ly but

irmly

pressed

me

to m aintain the product ion schedule . Pat r ic ia Ster l ing’s copy-

editing

was

sensitive and insightful;

her

changes and suggest ions invariably

served to clar if i and further

my

intentions.

M y

bro ther ,

F. J.

Fontinell ,

was of

gre at help in the on erou s tasks

of

r e c h e c h n g t h e numerous textual citations and the reading of the proofs

against themanuscr ipt . Further,

his

chasteningwitkeptme aughingly

aware

of

the gap between the scope and com plexi ty of the issues under

cons iderat ion and my t reatment of them.

Finally, wis h to express a w ord

of

apprec ia t ion to Joseph Ann ent i ,

e d t o r

of

T h e

P q i n Gedenkscll@:

Dinwnrions

iut

the

Hunran Religinrrs Quest

(Ann Arbor : U nivers i ty M icrof ilms Internat ional , 1986)’which includes a

memorial

essay incorporat ing segments

of

several chapters, principallyrom

Chapter

5 .

I should like to express my thanks to Robert Cordrng for permiss ion o use

his “ K e a d m g Donne” as the epigraph to this new edit ion and

to

An-terica

magazine, where the poem first was pu blish ed ; Sal M iceli, of Q u e e n s

Col-

lege

of

The

City

Univers i ty

of

New

Yo&;

and

Dr.

M a r y

Beatrice

Scbulte,

Execut ive Edi tor of Fordham Univers i tyPress, and her colleagues there for

the ir assistance in bringm g this new edition

to

fruition.



LIST

O F

A B B R E V I A T I O N S

Where

available, The

Works

of W illiam Jnmes

has

been

used. This critical edition of

James’s

writings is being

published by Harvard

University Press

with

Frederick

Burkhardt, General Editor,

and Fredson

Bowers,

Textual

Editor. Each volume

of

thc

Works ncludes the definitive critical edition of the text, extensive editorial notes, and

an introduction

by

a distinguished scholar.

Where a

second

datc

appears,

it is

the

year

of

the

work’s

original publication.

C E R

EP

E R E

HI

L

WJ

M S

M T

P

PBC

PP

PU

SPP

VR

E

W B

Coltelred

E s s q s nrtd

Reviews,

New York: Longmans, Green, 1920

Essays i t1 Philosophy, 1978

Essnys

i n

Radicd

Empiricism, 1976; 1912

Human Itnrnortality: TUJOupposed Object ions to the Doctritw, 2d

ed.,

with

preface,

Boston: Houghton MiWin, 1899

Letters o j

William j nmes ,

2

vols., e d . Henry

James,

Boston: Atlantic

Monthly

Press,

1920

Mernories n r ~ d tudies, New York: Longmans, Green, 1911

The Meatling o j Truth, 1975; 1909

Prqpatisrrr, 1975;

1907

Psychology: Briejer C o m e ,

1984; 1892

Principh ofPsycldogy, 2

vols.,

I981; 1890

A

Pl~rrdisticUrliverse,

1977; 1909

Some

Probkms

ofPhilosophy, 1979;

1911

The Varieties sf

Religious Experience,

1985; I902

T h e

Will

t o Believe, 1979; 1897



Introduction



Oh, wh y is no t man imm or ta l ?

. . .

W hy these

bra in

centcrs

a n d

the i r convolu t ions , why v is ion ,

specch, feeling, genius,

if

all

this is destined to

go in to the ground, u l t imate ly to growcold

together with the earth 's crust , and then for

millions

of

years to whir l wi th i t a round the sun

wi thou t aim or reason? Surely it is not necessary,

mere ly for the sake of th isooling

and whirl ing,

to draw man, w i th h is superior, almost godlike

intelligence,

o u t of oblivion and

then,

as

if

in

jest , to tu rn h im into clay.

" A n t o n C h e k h o v

Ward Six

T h u s o u r pcrsonali ty shoots, grows and ripens

without ceasing.Each of i ts nzomt 'ntss

some th ing new added to what

was

bcfore. We

may go fur ther : it is no t o n l y something new,

bu t so m eth ing unforeseeable .

-Henr i Be rgson

Crea t i ve

Evolution



There

would seem to

be

r hy thm s

of

emph asis in the his tory of Wcstern

thought that manifes t per~d ulum like swin gs . Th esean bc broad and

cultur-

a l

or narrow and tcchnical. Usually they are both. Am ong the mo st per-

sistent

swings

is the rationalistic-rom antic, wh ich takcs many forms. Onc

of the earhest was the Hellcnic-Hcllcnistic; evcn carlicr was the mythologi-

cal-rational. T h e primacy

of

the my thological

o r

religious should

bc

noted;

thcn, with the Greek creation o f philosophy, there begins

a

dialectic that

is

never pure andnever identical in its rcpeatcd manifestations but continues to

the present. F rom the first m om en t that an altcrnatc m ode o

thc

m ytho log-

ical account

of

the world em erge s, the dialectic begins.

Thc

mythological is

never completcly eradicated even fr o m Greek philosoph y

at

i ts apex, but

there is surely

a

shift

i n

dominance . I f it can be said that evcn Plato and

Aristotle retain certain mythological dimensions,

hey

are surely diminished

from

those foun d in hepre-Socratics.

I n

broad cultural erms, t would

seem that Nietzsche

is

right-sorncthing is killed, never to rct ur n in pre-

cisely the same form, by “Socratic rationalism.” However fulfilling a nd sat-

isfying thc exerciseof “reason” m ay have bcen for an e litc group of philoso-

pher/scien tists, t failed to satisfy thegenerality

of

humanbeings.

T h e

emergence and persistence of the Orphic a n d Elcusin ian m ys t er y d i g i o n s

alongside and con current w ith

Greek

philosophy is an early indication that

some aspect

of

hu m an experiencc, so m e nced, s notmetby“reason.”

W hether o r n o t the Hcllcnistic period was

a

“failurc

of

nerv e,” it represents

a period of varied and competing claims f o r human allegiancc,

only

one of

wh ich is the “rationrii.” Nevertheless, the rational hen ceforth w ill be

at

Icast

m e of the claims and will fulfill

a t

least one

h u m a n

nced. On ce this mode of

consciousness has em erge d, there is no

possibility of ever again com pletcly

suppressing it. It may and ndeed will be transformc d and mo dified,

bu t

i t

remains one

of

the con tinuin g charactcristics of the hum an si tuat ion.

More,

it

has

shown itself, particularly in the Wcst, to

bc

o n e o f

the

t w o

3



serious claims-the csthctic bcing the othcr-able to serve as alternatives to

religion.

Th c emergence

of

Christ ianity out of thc Hellenistic context moves the

dialectic to

a

new stagc. Very early the tension and outright onflict between

reason and faith appea rs.

This

faith /reaso n dialcctic has continucd

down

to

the present. Within the culturc

a t

large, w e havc tw o simple and clear posi-

tions: faith alone is su fic ie n t; reason alone is su ffk ien t. For most of Wcstern

history, however, the do m ina nt vicws have m ad e attem pts to account for

bo th. Th e Tertul lianantirationalisticpositionexpressedwh at has bcen a

continuing claim, but the view of Clement ofAlexandria that faith n r d rea-

son are both goo d and necessary

has been

the one that has held most Chris-

tians as well

as

mo st Jewish and Islamic thinkers.

Of

cou rsc, the abstract

assertion that faith and reason can no t be in r e d conflict is one thin g. Con-

crete dem ons tration th at existential and intcllcctual conflicts are o nly nppar-

etlt is quite another matter.

I

would suggest that no formal expression of the

relation betwe en faith and reason can ever bc perrnanc nt or definitive. At

best these expressions

can serve

as guidelines, as regulative ideals. Only in

the individual person can thewo

be lived

with a degree

of

relative har m on y

and reconc iliation; and even there thc tendency has becn for juxta po sition

rather than existential synthesis o r fruitful dialectic.

During the M iddle Ages and whilc the Ch urc h was the do m ina nt for-

mative factor, culturally and individually, the disputes conce rning the pr op -

er relation betweenfaithandreason were for the most part confined to

university c ircles.

All

this began to chan ge with the rise

of

the scientific

revolution.Whatever the m erits of the echnicalquestions hat em erg ed

concerning claims for the ncw science, this revolution

was to

have an effect

far bcy on d the intellectual milieu fro m w hi ch it originated. Ironically, the

anti-Galileo

ecclesiastics saw

or

sensed

this

more

perceptively

than

m a n y

defenders

of science,

includmg Galdeo himself.

What was com ing to

an end

was a world, a wo rld in w hich theistic faith (if no t m yth )

was

the central

and

controlling factor not only in matters explicitly eIigious but in

all

aspects of

hu m an life-political, cc on om ic, familial, and artistic.While dur ing he

Middle Ages phi losophy/sciencc had to show that it could

be

reconciled

with re l igion, f rom the eighteenth century on it was increasingly the

other

way around: religion had

to show

that it could

be

reconciled w ith science o r

reason. ln place

of

an earlier

view

that faith

d o r t e

was sufficient, the

En-

l ightenment brought forth

a

counterclaim that reason d o n e was sufficient.

just

as earlier fideists had view ed reason as a threat

to

the integrity of faith,

so the new rationalists viewed religious faith as a threat

to

the integrity

of

reason.

T he success of

the

ncw science and the new claims

for

reason can hardly

be exaggerated; there is

no

aspect

of Western

culture-and soon

one

will be

able to

say

of the world-that has rem aincd untou ched , for better or worse

or bo th ,

by

science and i ts consequences, proximate and rcrnote. Again,



Irltrodrrctiorr

5

howevcr, as in

the

Greek period, reiigion did not fold its tent and silently

slip away. T h c rcsponscs a m on g those w h o sti ll af i rm ed religion, as in the

earlier period, were varied and divcrse, ranging from com plete rejection of

scientific

or

rational claims, insofar as they touch cd upon an y fundan lental

religious o r moral values,

to

a complete rationalization of religion as the

highest flowering of reason. Between thcse extremes werc numerous efforts

to m odify the claims o f bo th science and religion in such

a

way as to s how

that both werc justifiable.

T h e present situation presents a bew ildering array o f positions reflecting

mos t of the previous responses

plus a number

peculiar to thc

age.

T h e c o m -

parison o f this age

to

the Hellenistic is well taken: it is

a

period characterized

by suprem e and near miraculous achievements

in

science and technology

cornbincd with a pro fou nd sensc of alienation, frustration,

a n d

despair (per-

haps unexceeded in hum an history), giving rise to a variety of cults, re-

ligious and other, al l pro m isin g personal salvation. I t has been pointed o ut

by

a

num ber

of

thinkers that as our know ledgeof the cosm os has incrcased,

our kno wledg e of ourselve s has no t. Earlier in the century , Max Scheler

noted that for the f irst t ime in history, man had beco m e profound ly prob-

lematical to himseIf. Paradoxically, knowledgc or knowledge claims per-

taining

to

thc hum an have become

so

massive and conflicting

as

to

under-

mine almost completely our earlier confidence in the human species as well

as in individuals.

To the earlierquestion “What am

I?”

and he sorncwhat more recent

“ W h o a m

I ? ”

has been adde d, wh ether

from

Eastern sources

or

Western

decon structionist sources, the ques t ion “Am I?”

T h e r e

is

perhaps no

more

astound ing shift

in

such a short period than the twentieth-cen tury shift of

the radicalizing seg m en t of the Westcrn intellcctual co m m un ity from hu-

manisticexistentialism to an antihum anistic tructuralismorpoststruc-

turalisrn. In the first half of the twentieth century,

ome

o f o u r most creative

thinkers were insisting

o n

the reality

of

the human subject and dcfending i t

against various modes ,of objectification, wh ether from science,

m a ss

cul-

ture,

technology,

o r

intellectualism. For about the

last

twenty-fiveyears,

however,

some

of the most brilliant and creative thinkers have heralded t h e

disappearance of

the sub ject, the self, the ego, the individu al, and the like.

T he hu m an sciences, i t is claimed, must surrender the human “subjcct”

if

the human is

to

be an “object” o f science. Th us we are confro nte d with

a

situation in which “no-self’ doctrines

are

advanced by subtlc and soph isti-

cated

thinkers. A feature of some Eastern religions that

is

said to show their

superiority

to

W estern religions is that they are no t ego cen tric, that they

recognize the illusory character

of

the indiv idua l self.

To suggest, at this time, not only that the individualself

is

real but that it

may possess a reality such that its existence will no t b e restricted to its pre-

sent spatio-temporal conditions, is pro ba bly

more

foolish than daring. And

yet, and yet

.

. .

it mus t

bc

done

if for no ot he r reason than the fact that thc



6

Ititroductiort

question of m y person seems to me unavoidable. If, of course, this is an

isolated and idiosyncratic feeling, then my efforts will have only

a

personal

therapeutic effect at most. But I do not believe that it is only my question,

and the only way to find out is to ask, however haltingly and inadequately,

and listen for a response.

Of

course, if the only task were to ask a pollster-

like question about the afterlife, it would be quite simple and, for some,

reassuring: it would seem that a surprisingly high number of human beings

still

say

they believe in an afterlife. But while such data are not completely

irrelevant, they do not take us far in relation to the crucial question: namely,

can we who have been touched by the intellectual and experiential revolu-

tions of the contemporary world still believe with any degree of coherence

and consistency that we as individual persons are immortal?

To

respond to

this question-it is not a question that has an “answer”-is to participate, in

however modest a way, in that long and continuing effort to show that one’s

faith is not only not in essential conflict with the best insights and achieve-

ments of contemporary thought and experience but that indeed this faith is

deepened and enriched by such insights. It is not false modesty to say that

the most I can hope to do is to hint at, or point to, or suggest how such a

harmonization might be realized. Whatever the merit of any particular effort

to realize consistency between “faith” and “reason,” I share with John Her-

man Randall, Jr., the view that it is an eminently worthwhile effort. This

attempt to bring “religious beliefs into accord with philosophic truth” is

designated by Randall “rational” or “philosophical theology.” As he states:

“Its worth lies not in the formulations of the moment-they will soon give

way to others. It lies rather in the conviction that it is supremely important

to make the never ending effort to understand.”l

No response to the question, “Is the individual person immortal?” is pos-

sible without

a

prior response to the question, “What is the nature of the

individual person?” Or, in keeping with the kind of objections already re-

ferred to, “Are there such realities as individual persons?” In raising this

question, one opens

a

Pandora’s box, for there emerges a bewildering vari-

ety of allied questions-some with long histories, and others that involve

very technical matters. Among these questions are the following: Are

human beings completely accounted for in terms of matter (bracketing the

question as to what matter is)? Are human beings composed of both matter

and spirit, body and soul? If

so,

what is the role and relation of each? Are

these really distinct principles or only distinct functions? What is the nature

of consciousness? Is it substantive or only epiphenomenal? Are mind and

brain identical? If not, how can they be differentiated? What is the nature of

the human body? Is there personal identity? If

so,

how can it be accounted

for?

Is

there a distinction between the individual and the person? If so, what

is it? Is the human being identical with and reducible to her or his behavior?

Is the human being reducible to the various social structures that constitute

it

?



Itztvodiiction 7

The literature on these questions is vast, varied, and in many instances

highly technical, both philosophically and scientifically. Yet one can say

with reasonable assurance that there is no one position concerning the

nature of the human person, philosophical or scientific, that has anything

approaching a definitive consensus. Perhaps there will someday emerge an

understanding of the human

so

overwhelmingly persuasive that only cranks

will dissent. For the foreseeable future, however, anyone reflecting on this

question will have to make some crucial choices, assumptions, or acts of

faith. At what might be called the relatively unreflective leve1,“you picks

your horse and bets your money” and let it

go

at that. Some will accept

without question that we are merely what can be seen and touched, weighed

and measured; others who insist that we are more than

our

bodies will sim-

ply assert that this “more” is spirit or soul. The first group does not even

consider immortality. Its view is expressed succinctly in such time-honored

phrases as “seize the day,” or “you only live once,” or “eat, drink, and be

merry for tomorrow we die,” or “when you’re dead you’re dead.” The

second group has its own time-honored phrases: “What shall i t profit a man

if he shall gain the whole world and lose his own soul?”; “this life is but

a

preparation for the next”; “the visible world is temporal while the invisible

world is eternal”; “I’m but

a

stranger here-heaven is my home.”

Both views have a variety of more or less reflective and sophisticated ex-

pressions, but they can be broadly reduced to two classical modes: namely,

materialism and dualism. Materialism has no difficulty with the question of

immortality, since it is ruled out from the start. Whatever versions of mate-

rialism are advanced, they all share the view that the individual human self

has no reality apart from or beyond the particular material complex called

the “body.” The situation with dualism is a bit more complex, because

while all materialisms exclude immortality, not all dualisms affirm immor-

tality. Aristotelian dualism, for example, apparently does not, or at least

does not clearly, allow for immortality. Thomistic or Cartesian dualism, on

the other hand, affirms at least the ontological possibility if not the necessity

of personal immortality.

Perhaps any affirmation of immortality must involve some mode of du-

alism. If so, the defender of immortality must face the formidable anti-

dualistic views that have proliferated in the twentieth century. The various

critiques of any form of Cartesian “ghost in the machine” have come close

to an antidualistic consensus. Such issues, however, are not settled by a head

count, even if those heads are impressive philosophical

or

scientific ones;

hence, it would be simply incorrect to say that dualism has been philosophi-

cally or scientifically refuted. Arthur Lovejoy’s The Refirtation o

Diralisni,

written over fifty years ago, in which the claims of a variety of impressive

philosophers to have overcome dualism are seriously and subtly challenged,

still stands as a caution against those who would lightly dismiss dualism. In

addition, the work of such respectable contemporary dualists as H. D.



Lewis, Peter Geach, and Roderick C hi sh ol m serves as evidence that dualism

remains

a

respectable philosophical option.

Even thou gh dualism does not necessarily entail personal imm orta lity,

there can be no question that it

is

em inently cong enial to it , and that any

doctrine

of

im m or tali ty m ay be at least implicitly dualistic. This wou ld be

so

i f dualism w ere defined so broadly as to includc any view claiming that

the reality of the individual

self

is not confined to ts visible spatio-temporal

coordinates . Such a definition of dualism , however, seems un w arran tedly

broad since ma ny philosophies that claim to be antidualistic-such as vari-

o u s

forms of phenomenology-deny

along

with M artin He idegg er hat the

self is enclosed within the envelopeof the skin. As I

see

it, there are numer-

ous

and often conflicting cfforts to devise

a

doctr ine

of

the

self that escapes

bo th classical materialism and classical du alis m . Th es e efforts, in m y opin-

ion, offer the richest possibilities for an adeq uate do ctrine of the self. M y

particular concern is w heth er th ey inev itably exclude th e possibility

of

per-

sonal mmortality. That m os t of

t h e m

claim to do so is unqu estionable;

whether

a

non-dualistic do ctrine that does no t exclude imm or tali ty is plausi-

ble is the que st ion w ith w hich I am concerned.

What I

would

like to suggest and broadly sketch is

a

doctr ine of the sclf

that

is

reasonably consistent w it h

a t

least

one

m o d e

of

contemporary anti-

dualism-namely, pragm atism principally

as

expressed in the work of

WilliamJames and to a lesser extent in Jo h n Dewey)-and yet is open to the

possibility of belief in personal im m orta lity. i f such belief can be rcasonably

justified, therefore, it wou ld not find itself in conflict w ith or m ere ly jux -

taposed to a do ctr ine of th e self essentially uncongenial to such bclief. I

think doctrines of the self and im m ort alit y are needed that m utua lly rein-

force one anothe r . He nce, while

I

do

not

believe it

possiblc

to construct

a

view o f the

self

that logically entails im m ort ality ,

I

do

no t think i t enough

to

have a self that m e d y does no t positively and absolutely exclude irnrnor-

tality. What is needed is

a

self

that w ould be essentially enhanced

by

its

extension t o life bey ond the visible present. B y the sam e toke n, an

irnrnor-

tality belief merely jux tap os ed or tacked

on

to the existential self wili no t

do. Such

belief

must be s h o w n

to

be here urd now significant and effective; i t

must not merely refer to some fut ure realization-though i t will involve

the

future-but

bc

a contributing factor to the on go ing existential consti tut ing

of

the self.

M y

essay, thcrefore, has two bro ad divis ions , distinc t bu t not separate:

the possibility

of im m orta lity, and the desirability

of

immortality. The first

will focus on the nature

of

the self and endeavor to const ruct

a

doct r ine or

model that is internally coh erent, reasonably consistent, and also congenial

to immo rtality.

A

crucial corollaryof this doctr ine of theelf is an organica l-

ly

related doctrine of God, since it will be argued that only a self that has

as

one of its co ns titu en t relations he relation

to

God has the possibi l i ty for

immortality.

The

second

part

of

the essay

will

at tempt

to

show that imm or-



Irjtrodtrction 9

tality is desirable, both in pointing toward an attractivc mode of life and in

energizing hu man beings here and now.

PRAGMATISM’S ME TAPHY SICAL

ASSUMPTIONS

Before presenting doctr ines

of

thc self and G o d,

it

will be neccssary to indi-

cate something of

how

I view the character of thc “w orld ” or “reali ty.”

W hy, it may be asked, if onc is conccrncd with the quest ion

of

immortal i ty ,

is it necessary to take

o n

such all-encompassing and ov erw he lmin g qucs-

tions as “W hat is thc wo r ld?” or “W ha t is reality?” To do so is to leap into

that intellectual thicket in wh ich ma ny formida blc thinkers have bec om c

hopelessly lost or to step intoan intellectuai quicksand that has relcntlessly

consumed precious hu m an energies.

To

put i t crudely, wh y ope n up the

metaphysical “can ofworms”? The simplest response is

to

no te that

a

wor ld

from which personal inlmortai i ty is excluded and

a

w orld in w hich it is

possible are radically digerent-and that difference gives rise to experiential

consequences o f great significance.

Does this mean that unless w e can present a fully dcvelopcd and systemat-

ic metaphysics, wc are prohibitcd from reflecting n the question of immor-

tality?

I

sincerely hope not , for

uch

a n accomplishment is

m u c h

beyond the

intellectual capability not only

of

most reflective humans but

of

most pro-

fessional philosophers. There is, however,

a

less formal sense o f metaphysics

that touche s, in various degrees, practically all

of us.

I refcr to metaphysics

as

an

“anglc of vision” or perspective from wh ich

we

view the wo rld and by

means of which w e interact with a n d pcrhaps con stitutc the wo rld. This

perspective involves a num ber

of

fundamen tal assumptions which, though

for the most part unquestioned, influence o u r lives in their various

sphcres

andactivities-assumptions,forcxam plc, hat herc is

a

wo rld; that his

world is independent of us; that we can know this world;

that

there is truth

and crror,rightand w ro n g; that w e as individualsexist. I use the erm

“assumptions” deliberately because mo st pcop lc simply take fo r gran ted ,

w ithou t q ues tion , th e principles or values by w hich they livc.

O f coursc, that hum an activity which has bcen designated “philosophy”

has always had as part of its task the qu estio ning of thos e assu m ption s, a nd

the various positions

takcn in regard

to

thc m havc givcn rise to a rich variety

of philosop hies. While in on e sense this is quite obv ious, in anothc r sense it

is less

so.

Nietzsche pcrhaps ov erstated the

case,

but

not

by m uch, when hc

accused philosop hers of failing to question their assum ptions. Philosophers

have never been hesitant to question other philosop hers’ assum ptions, but

they have ofre11 claimcd that their ow n w er e “g iv en ”

or

“sclf-evident”

or

“provcd” (by them). M ost philosophers today are more mo dest than that

about their philosophical claims, but whilc few would maintain that abso-

lute certitudc is rcalizable, m os t reject skepticism, radical subjcctivisrn, and

destructive relativism.

We might designate two

broad

tasks as involved in any philosophical

cn-



10 Irltmductiort

deavor. Th e first is to clarify, articulate, and describe thc me taphysical as-

sumptions that govcrn one’s inquiry. While these principles are not, strictly

spcaking, provable and

arc

in a sense acts of faith, they m ust nevcrthcless be

reasonably cohcrcnt

and

consistent with data from all kinds

of

experience-

ordinary, scientific, csthetic, religious, and m ora l. Th e sec on d task, there-

fore, is to present evidence an d/ or ar gu m en ts in supp or t of these

assump-

tions or principles and to draw out hcir

inlplications-theoretical

and prac-

tical. The diverse way s in wh ich these tasks are executed result in the variety

and diversity o f philosophies manifest in every age but particularly in the

twentieth century.

O n e twen tieth-century way has been designated “pragmatism”-which

doesno t tell usvcry much,since here

arc

probably

as

manydistinct,

thoug h not totally different, pragm atism s

as

there are pragmatists. But since

I claim that

my

approach to the quest ion of personal immortality is “prag-

matic,” I m us t

indicate

what I am presupposing

when

I

usc

the term. The

m o d e

of

pragmatism-though

i t

is bu t on e version-to wh ich I incline and

which I am presupposing for the purposes of this essay can bc described as

processive, relational, pe rsonalistic, and pluralistic.

Additionally, I will understand pragmatism as both

a

metaphysics and a

method

of

evaluation.

1

use the ph rase “method

of

evaluation” rather than

“theory of

truth”

in order to bypass

the

long,

tortuous,

and often conten-

tious

criticism

of

pragmat ism

as

a theory of t ru th . I would, however, insist

o n

one

point: regardless of whether one speaks of “pragma t ic t ruth” o r

“pra gm atic evaluation,” neither can be dealt w ith ad equ ately with ou t ac-

kno wled ging the distinctive metaphy sics that accom panies and is insepara-

ble f rom them.

Now to speak of “pragmatic metaphysics”may seem ox ym oro nic , s ince i t

is

well

kn ow n that.p rag rna tisrn is antimetaphysical

if

me taphysics is under-

stood in its classical sense as know ledge of the ul timate and unchang ing

character of being- or reality-in-itself. In this senseof the term, pragmatism

t

mo st can be described as

a

m o d e of metaphysical agnosticism, since it denies

that

we

can

know

what is, or whether there is, “ultimate rea1ity”“that is,

reality constituted in itself unrelatcd to

h u m a n

experience;’ further, though

pragmatism describes reality in

terms

of processes, it remains agnostic con-

cerning any ult imate origin or end of

the

world process or processes. Ncv-

ertheless, pragmatism does no t hesitate

to

venturc so m e metaphysical

guess-

es or con s t ruct

some

metaphysical myths by way of extrapolation from

concrete experience

as

to

what characterizes reality or the world.While, on

the

basis of

what is available to human experience, therc can

be

no absolute

origin or absolute end, stil l we can discern and/or speculate about possible

direct ions and op t to w ork for som e direc tion s an d against others. Such

efforts, o f course, must be cnergized byeliefs and hop es wh ich, hough not

“provable,” are nevertheless “reasonablc.”

This

last point brings

us

back

to

“pragmatic cvaluation,” which

I

will



considcr a bit latcr. First, let me rctu rn to thc fou r eatures

of

pragmat ism

as

I

dcfinc i t . Instead o f vicwing

t h e m as

featurcs

of

pragmat ism, howcvcr,

I

will trcat them as characteristics

of

reality or the world; thus, t hc world

prcsupposcd thr ou gh ou t this essay is proccssivc, clatiunal, p cr so ~~ al ist ic ,

and pluralistic. T h e first tw o characteristics arc devclopcd thr ou gh ou t thc

body

o f thc tcxt; in sum m ary ,

a

world of processes and rclations contrasts

sharply and im portantly w ith

a

world of permanent or unchanging sub-

stances,

laws,

esscnccs, and valucs. Pragm atism’s wo rld cxcludcs bo th mcta-

physical du alism wh crcin reality is divide d into cha ng ing and unchanging

or tcrnporal and eternal rcalitics, and any atomistic individualisnl whcrein

beings (atoms o r gods)

exist

as

cssentially u nr cl at io n~ l, isolated. self-

enclosed, o r sclf-suficicnt.

I n

the language of Ja m es , this is

a n

“unfinished

universc” o r a “w or ld in the making”

a n d

is thercby opcn

to

radical novchy.

All modcs of

h u m a n

activity take on 3 potential ly creat ivc r o k

i n

such a

world. What thc world will bc depends, a t least in pa rt, o n o u t thoughts ,

beliefs, lovcs, ho pe s, hates, and actions. T h e nature and rolc of i ~ n r nor t a l i t y

belief within such

a

w orld is, of course, a central concern of this essay.

W O R L D O R REALITY

AS “PERSONALISTIC”

Therc

is

a

s t ronger and

a

wcakcr

S C ~ S C

n

wh ich the wo rld or reali ty

call

be

designated “personalistic.” In the wcaker

sense we would

have

a

world that

includcs

o r

gives rise to

s a n e

beings categorizcd as “p crs on s.” A pcrson-

alistic w orld

117

the s t ronger sense would

bc

one in which all rcal beings arc

characterized by “pc rson ho od .” For mostpeoplc, the firstclaim s

ob-

viously truc and the sccond ob vio us ly false. W hich of these senscs wo uld

express pragmatism’s m ean ing of “personalistic world”? A s stated, neither;

propcrly modified, howevcr, p ragmatism’s rncaning would be

closer to the

stro ng sense. Pragmatism’s version

of

such

a

world claims to find in pcrson-

a1

expcricnce traits c o m m o n

to

all realities. Therc arc hints, t hough n o de-

veloped prescntation, of such a vicw in Jamcs, Dewcy, and Alfred Nor th

W hitehcad, who-on this p o i n t at east-can bc brought undcr the

u m -

brella of pragm atism. Befo re rcview ing tcxts in which these thrce thinkers

maintain that a n y metaphysical gcneralizations

must

be groundcd in immc-

diate

experience, it is impor tan t

to

understand what is m ean t by “experi-

ence” throughout this essay, particularly because much

of

wh at will be said

abou t self , G od , an d im m orta l i ty will

be

extrapolatcd from

pcrsonal

expcr-

ience.

T h e nature and rolc

of

“experience” within pragmatismis

a

sto ry in itself,

a

lon g an d no t always clcar on e. For prcsent

purposcs,

a

fcw

key points will

sufflcc. “Expcriencc,” for the pragmatists, is

not

identical with the “experi-

encc” o f classical em piricism stemm ing from D a v i d Humc and John Stuar t

M ill. T h c differences are described clcarly and sharply by Dcwcy in

a

1917

essay cntitlcd, “TheN e c dfor a Rccovery inPhilosophy.”3

He

contrasts

what

I

shall

call

the

traditional and

the

pragm atic views o n five points. First,



whereas xperience n the raditionalview is primarily a “knowlcdgc-

affair,”

for the pragmatist it is “an affair

of

the intercourse

of

a Iiving being

with its physical and social cnv iron m en t.” Se con d, expcricnce fro m the tra-

ditional perspectivc is pri m ari ly psychical and pcrrncated by “subjectivity”;

to the pragmatis t , experience suggcsts an object ive world modifying and

modified by human actions and sufferings. Third, experience is traditionally

seen as tied to th c past o r as “given ”; in i ts pragm atic mode

it is

experimcn-

tal, oriented to ch ang ing the given and thereby having conn ection with a

futu rc as its salient trait. Th e fou rth po int of contrast is between an “em-

pirical tradition committed to particularism” and o n e

for

which experiencc

is “p reg na nt w ith con nc ction s.” Finally. experience and thoug ht are anti-

thetical terms from the traditional p erspectivc, wh ercas pragmatism’s expe-

rience is “full of inference”and hereb y ende rs reflection“nativeand

constant.”

Stated

most

succinctly and i n Deweyan language, experience for the prag-

matist is an organism-environm ent t ransactiona4 Since there arc a variety

and diversity of such transactions, therc is a variety o f experiences differing

in scope and quality, suc h as cogn itivc exp erience, c sthctic cx pcrience, affec-

tive exp erien cc, and religim s expe:iencc. W hile we can distinguish hese

various experiences, they never operate in complete isolation, nor d o thcy

relate

to

separate

modes of

reality.

How

these different modes of experience

relate,

overlap, and interpcnetratc is

a

most complex question and can never

be

described with definitive clarity. An y distinctions betwe en them are nev-

er made “for thcir ow n sake” or in an at temp t to mirror the way hese

experiences allegedly

are

“in themselves.” Rather, thc distinctions can only

be justified pragmaticaIly insofar as thcy deepen , enrich, and illuminate the

quality of hu m an ife.

Bearing in m ind

this

view

of

expcrience

as

transactional,

let

u s

look

a t

a

few texts

that

point toward pragmatism as a “metaphysics of experience,” In

his essay “Th e Philoso phy of W hitehca d,” De we y notes hat whatever their

otherphilosophical differences, “the back grou nd and point of depar ture

seems

to

be the same for both of us.” T he crucia1 point held in co m m on is

that “the traits of experience provideclews for form ing‘generalizcd dcscrip-

tions’ of nature.” Dewey goes o n

to

emphasize the importanceof this shared

claim:

The idea that the imm ediate traits

of

distinctively human expericncc are highly

specialized cases of what actually gocs

on

in every actualized event of nature

does

infinitcly more han merely deny the existence of an impassable gulf

between physical and psychological subject matter. It authorizes us,

as

philos-

ophers engaged in forming highly general ized descript ions

of

nature , to use

the

traits

of

immediate experience 5 clews

for

intcrprct ing our observat ions f

non-human and non-animate na ture .

5

Ther e

is

l i tt le do u bt that Dewey has correctly represented W hitehead’s per-

spective,

for

early in Process and Renli ty we are told that “the clucidation of



Itltrndtlctiorr

13

immediate experience is the sole justification for any thoug ht; and the start-

ing point for tho ug ht is the analytic observationof components of this expe-

riencc.”hElsewhere,Whitehcadstates: “Theworldwithin

cxpcricncc

is

identical with the

world

beyond e x p ~ r i e n c c . ” ~

Earlier than either Dewcy o r Whitehead, James insisted that personal ex-

pericncc is the crucial pathw ay to w hatever reality is available to us. In his

last work, unpublished a t the t ime of his death, James asks “whetherwe are

not ‘here witnessing in our own personal experience what is really the es-

sential process of creat ion” (SPP, lOS} *

And

in the last w o r k

he

published,

he maintained that “ the onlymater ia l we haveat

our

chsposal for making a

picture of the w ho le wo rld s supplied by the various por t ions

of

that world

of

w h i c h w e

have

already had exp erience ”

(PU,

9).

A

s i d a r

point

had

been expressed elsewhere: “No philosophy can everd o more than in te rpre t

t he w ho le , w h ich

is

unknown, af ter the analogy of

some

particular part

which w e k n o w ” (CER,449).

I

will later discuss the w ell-known-some m ig ht say notorious-Jamesian

no tion that life o r experience “excceds

our

logic” and its corollary thatexpe-

rience o r feeling brings us to a deeper and richer reality, to “m or e” reality,

than we are ever able

to

verbalize or conceptualize. Here I wo uld like merely

to to uch upo n this them e insofar as it indicates

a

dim ension o f wha t is im-

plied in the claim that we live in a personalistic univcrsc.

Ralp h Barton Perry does not hesitate to say that the priority of original

experience over representations or descriptions is “ the mo st general princi-

ple

in

Jam es’s p h i I o ~ o p h y , ” ~ames himself emphasized “the gaping contrast

between the richness of life and the po verty

of

all possible formu las”

(TC,

11:127),

and ma intained that “so m ethin g forever exceeds, escapes fro m state-

ment ,wi thdraws from definition,mustbeglimpsedand fel t, no t old ”

(TC,

II:329).

It

is

in relig ion that th e personal an d feeling characteristics

are

mo st in evidence, for “th e religious individual tells you that the divine

meets

him o n the basis of his personal concerns” (VRE,387). Further, “feeling

is

the deeper source of religion,” a nd that is w h y Jame s calls theolog ical for-

mulas secondary. H e do ub ts that any philosop hic theolog y wo uld ever even

have been framed “in a world in whichno religious feeling had

ever

existed”

( V R E ,

341). o

The point I particularly wish to stress here is that while the personal and

experientialarepreeminently fou nd inreligion, heyarenotexclusively

found

there. Jam es ma intains hat scientific and religious ruths are con-

sis tent and ho m og en eou s

because,

insofar as their final appeal is

to

experi-

ence, they are bo th “truth s of experience”

(TC,

I:451). A mo re imp or tan t ,

and su rely mo re controversial claim

is

that o u r deepest and fullest grasp of

reality is by means o f th e personal rather than the impersonal: “So long as

we deal w ith the cosmic and the gen eral , we deal only with the syrnbols of

reality, but

as

soon a5

we deal

with

the

private

and

personal yhenometja

a5

S U C ~ , e

deal

u d h

realities

in

the

completest

sense

of

t h e

lerm”

( V R E ,

393).

Thus,

from

James’s perspective, the “impersonality of

the

scientific attitude” is shallow.



Bu t James docs not consider the im pers on al w orld dcscribed b y m od ern

science a s the last word, even for science.

T h e

spirit and principles

of

science

are

mere

affairs of

method; there

is

nothing

in them that need hinder science from dealing successfully w i t h a wor ld

i n

which personal forces are t hc starting-point of new effects. T h e only form of

things that we directly encounter, the only experience hat we concrctr ly

h a w ,

is o u r own

personal life. .

. . And

this

systcmatic

denial on science’s

part

of

personality

as

a condition

of

events, this rigorous

belief

that in its ow n essen-

tial and innermost n a t ~ l r e l l r world

is a

strictly

impcrsonal

world,

may,

con-

ceivably, as the whirligig

of

t i m e goes round,

prove

to be thc very dttfcct that

o u r descendants will be most surprised

a t

in o u r own boastcd science, he

omission

that to

their

cyes

will

most

tend

to

m a k e

i t

look

perspcctiveless

and

shor t .

( W B ,

241)

In sum , then, pragm atism’s universe can be said to be “personalistic” or

“expcricntial” because transactional activity, which is most immediately and

richly evidenced in persona1 experience, is generalized o r posited as “rncta-

physical”: that is, as con stitutive

of

all realities. “ H u m a n ” experience, there-

fore, is not in

ome

magical fashion superad ded to nature; rathcrt

is

but

onc

of

a

multiplicity

of

modes

of

transactional activity. Hence, James insists that

the “word ‘activity’ has no irnaginab lc content w hateve r save these experi-

ences

of

process, obstruc tion, striving , strain, or rclease, ultimate q u a l i a as

they are of the life given us to be known.”

We

cannot, therefore, suppose

activities to

g o

on outs ide our exper ienceunless we suppose them in forms

like these ( E R E , 84).

T h c

metaphysics presupposed by pragmatism, then,

might properly be designated “transactional realism.”

PLURALISTIC

U N I V E R S E

T h e processive-pluralistic character of reality will

be

in cvidence thro ug ho ut

the body

of

the text. We shall com e to see in more detail that in the w orld

presupposed by pragmatism there is a multiplicity of ccntcrs of activity, no

one of which

is

completcly isolated or unrelated and no onc of which in-

cludes all the othe rs.

If

we designate this “ontological pluralism,” then we

cancall itscorrelativepluralism“epistemological.” Inasmuch as this is

a

“pluralistic, restless univ erse,” the entire univ erse can not

be

encompasscd

within any single po int

of

view

(WB,

136).

According toJames, “We have

so

many differcnt businesses with nature that no one

of

the m yields us

an

all-

embracing clasp”

(PU,

19).

1

Experience

shows

us that the universe is “ a

m or e many-sided affair than any sect, even thc scientific sect, allows fo r”

( W E , 104). Since “to no one

type

of mind is it given to discern the totality

of

t ru th” ( W B , 224),James is led to suggest that “co m m on sense is better for

one sphere of Iife, science for ano ther, ph iloso phic criticism for

a

third” I),

93). Such epistemological pluralism is, of course, a m o d e of perspectivism,

but

it

is

not-or at least no t ob vio us1 y”a m od e

of

destructive relativism

and superficial subjectivism. Pragm atism ackn ow ledges that every tho ug ht



claim is perspectival and partial, bu t it does no t th ereb y con ccd c that we are

prohibited from making reasonable choices am on g such claims or perspec-

tives. W hich brings us to the nature and role of “pragmatic e valuation.”

PRAGMATIC INQUIRY AND EVALUATION

An y pragm atic inquiry is indefinitely open-ended, particularly when deal-

ing with such issues as

self, Go d, and imm ortality. The initial stage m igh t

be

designated “ pro bativ e” o r “e xp lorato ry.” n this stage,

a

hypothesis must

be constructed that is no t glaringly contradictory or inconsistent. T h e evi-

dence in favor of the hy po thesis m ust be bro adly described and its possible

fruits indicated. This stage will, for the most part, bracket r move gingerly

over

many technical details an d difficulties to w hich the hyp othe sis gives

rise.

(It

is within this stage that,

for

the mo st part, the present essay will be

located.) Subsequent stages

of

a pragm atic inquiry will have to deal with

these diffrculties and eithe r ov erco m e them or m od ify the hy po thesis ac-

cordingly. C oncu rrently, the projected “fruits” will

have

to beevaluated.

This meet ing of diff’culties and evaluation of frui ts wil l bc co ntinuous and

ongoing, and he hypo thesis will remainviable on ly as lo ng as, “on the

whole,” the d i f f~cul t ies are not insuperable and the fruits are sufficiently

abundant .

In regard to the investigation and evaluation of personal imm ortali ty, the

pragm atist insists upo n two things. First, i t cann ot be either proved or dis-

proved.

Second, and

more im po rta nt, believers have the obligation to evalu-

ate their belief and to search o u t its “justifying re3sons.”12 Such evaluation

must evcntuaIly relate to conc rete cxpcrienc e. Morc specifically, it must re-

spond to the extentpossible to the overwhelm ing mass

of

cumulative

expc-

rience, wheth er qu otidia n, histo rical, artistic, scientific, moral, o r religious.

Any

conclusion s xcachcd in this evaluative process will always

be

tentativc

and subject to modification under the

press

of fu turecxpcricncc. but we are

not thereby cxcused from ma king the mo st “reason ablc” case possible at

any moment . l 3

Without pretending to present 3 fuIly developed description of pragmatic

inquiry and cvaluation, I would like to call attention to

a

few crucial p oin ts

both for

the purpose

of

clarification and to avoid

a

gross misunders tanding

of the claims ofp rag m atisrn . To begin with, whatever thc diffkulticsassoci-

ated w ith pragmatism’s “method”-and thcy are

n u m er o u s

a n d

wcll

docu-

mented-there is n o possibility of unders tanding it

unless

one remains

aware

of

itsmetaphysicalassumptions, alrcadyalludcd to. Pragmat ism

posits

a

processive-relational w or ld, an “unfinished universe,”

a

“world in

the making.” Within such

a

wo rld, prag m atism opposcs-in thc language

of Dewey-any “p art itio nin g of erritories’’ wh ereb y “facts” are assigned to

science and“values”

to

philosophyandreligion.

I t

denies hatscience is

grounded

o n

reason while mo rality and religion are gro un dc d o n faith. I

Pragmatism very early surrendered the great Western dre am , bro ug ht to

a

crescendo by Rcn6 Descartes and reprised by Ed m un d Husscr l,

of

ground-



16

Irrtrodt.rctior1

ing ph ilo so ph yls cie nc e on n absolutely certain foundation.1s This rejection

does not lcad the pragmatist to embrace either irrationalism

or

subjectivistic

relativism. Reason has

a crucial and indispensable role to play i n human life;

it is , however, bu t on e m od e

of

experience, on e m od e

of

transaction

be-

tween poles o f reality, and it neither exists nor operates in isolation from

other modes .

For pragma tism, the wo rld is neither simply “rational” nor “irrational,”

though i t involves dim ension s of both. There is evidence for belicving that

the world

is b e m r r i q

more rational and that humans have a crucial role

to

play in that rationa lizing

process.

“T he w or ld, ” James tells

us,

“has shown

itself, to a great extent, plastic to this dcmand of ou rs for rationality.” H e

goes

on

to

say that the only mc ans

of

f inding out how

m u ch

m o r e

i t

can

become rational is t o t r y ou t ou ronceptions

of

m ora l as well as mechanical

or logical necessity ( W B , 115). 6 In surre nd ering the quest for absolutes-

wh ether found ations, truths, values, o r ends-pragmatism is not

surrender-

in g its q ue st fo r “ r e a s ~ n a b l e n e s s . ” ~ ~urther, the denial of final c losur e on

anyqucstion does notexclude thepossibility of-indeed, thcnecessity

for-intellectual

a n d

existential judgments anddecisions. All nontrivial

judgments and decisions will have the characteristics of incompleteness and

tentativeness and will lack the feature

of

absolute certitude.

Of

course,

if

probab ility and provisionality were merely cha racteristics

of

pragmatic in-

quiry and evaluation, it wou ld hard ly

be

of mo me nt. Pragm atism insis ts ,

however, that the limitations of inq uir y are due not to the incompetence of

pragmatis ts but to the nature of the

world

within wh ich inquiry and valua-

tion are exercised. James conced es that pragm atism can be legitimately re-

proached with “vag uene ss and subjectivity and ‘on-the-whole’-ness,” but

he quickly adds that the “entire life of man”

is

liable to the same reproach.

“If

we

claim only reasonable probability, it

will

be as mu ch as m en w ho ove

the truth can

ever

a t

any g iven moment hope to have within their grasp”

( V R E ,

266, 267). 9

All pragmaticevaluations, whether of ideas, beliefs, valucs, or institu-

tions, are always

open

to modification and correction. As statcd by D ewey:

“A ny

onc of

our belicfs is subjcct to criticism, revision,

a n d even

ultimate

elimination hrough hedevelopment of

i ts ow n mp licationsby intcl-

ligently directed action.”2o If pragmatism’s method cane said to

bc

model-

ed

o n

that

of

modern

science, it

is

insofar as it share s with cience the feature

of self-correction. This is

a

co m m un ity process with “later views correct ing

earlier ones” (PP, 1:191), resulting in a continually cumu lating espericncc.”

This cumulative experiencc nables us to build on earlier successes, however

partial, n an eff ort oengenderne w successes, howeverpartial. While

“there are no successes

to be

guaranteed” ( V R E , 299) and n o certain, uncor-

rectable conclusions to

be

reached,wcare not thereby “playing into the

hands of ske pticism .” Jam es insists that it is on e thing “to ad m it one’s lia-

bil ity to correct ion ” and quite another

“to

embark upon

a

sea

of

wanton

doub t” (

V R E , 267).



1ntr.odrtctiorl

17

Granted tha t pragmatism excludes any definitive “once and for

all”

m o d e

of cvaluation, ho w m igh t it be described rnorc positively? Statcd simply,

much too simply,wecan say that w ith in the processive-relational world

presu pp ose d by prag m atism , idcas, beliefs, sym bo ls, and institutions-all

of wh ich originate in experience-can bc jud ge d on ly on the basis

of

the

experientialconscquences or qu al ity of life they brin g forth . Th is is ex-

pressed most succinctly in Dewcy’s pragmatic test foranyphilosophy:

“Does i t end in conclusions wh ich, wh en they are referred back to ordinary

life-experiences and their pred icame nts, rend er thc m m o re significant, m o re

luminous to us, and mak e our dealings with them more frui tful?”” The

conscquentialism that distinguishcs pragmatism is by no means crystal clear

and consistent, nor does it have an identical me an ing

in

Charles Sanders

Peirce, Jam es, and Dew ey. W ithout making any at tempt to delineate what

the methods of these three pragmatis ts share and wherehey diverge, let me

simply draw

o n

a

few

texts ofJa m es, since his approach is most congenial to

my purposes.

To begin with, thcre is a well-rccognizcd am big uity in James’s pragm atic

rncthod that allows for bo th

a

positivistic and a personalistic rcading.

T h u s

Elizabeth Flower and M urray G. Murphey note a certain relaxation o f the

pragmatic cr iter ion whereby i t is broadened “from verifying consequences

in particular sensible expericnces to consequences for the quality of hum an

living.”23

I t

is the personalistic o r human istic crnpha sis to w hich I am at-

tracted and which

I

conside r mo re faithful to the

full

range ofjamcs’s notion

of experience. S om eth in g of his is expressed by H.

S .

Thayer: “T h e partic-

ularly extraordinary feature o f Prugrmztisrn

.

. . is its reflection ofJames’s ar-

dent concern to bring philosophic thought into immediate contact with the

real perplexities, the uncertainties and resurgent hopes that permeate ordi-

nary human experience”

(P ,

xxxv ii). Perry, in no ting that

for

James “the

basic dogmas of religion are not wholly wi thout evidence,” addshat James

compiles this evidence by “appealing to experience in the broad sense, and

rejecting that narrower or positivistic vc rsion of experience which already

presupposes

a

naturalistic world-order.”24T h i s broadened meaning of expe-

rience is expressed in whatwasperhaps Jarncs’s last formulat ion

of

the

“pragmatic rule”: “T he pragmatic rule is that

the

meaning

of

a concept may

always be fou nd, if not in s om e sensible particular which it directly desig-

nates, then

in

s o m e

particular difference in

the

course

of

hu m an experience

which its being true will make” ( S P P ,

37).

In stressing the practical consc qucn ces, for “any one,” of an idea or a be-

lief, Jam es left himself o pe n

to

the charge of fos ter ingnarrow and destruc-

tive subjectivism.

There

can

be

no do ub t that his failure to make so m e cru-

cial distinctions lent some support to this ~ h a r g e , ~ 5hough I am persuaded

that the weigh t and totality

of

his th o ug ht is against it. Jame s

surely

in-

tended

to

make satisfaction

of

the individual

a

crucial factor in any prag m at-

ic evaluation,

but

what

is no t u sually adequ ately stressed is that Jame s

re-

jected the atomistic individualism that is a necessary co m po ne nt of

the

kind



18 Itttrodrrctiott

of subject ivism with which hc was oftcn charged. I t is the burden of a largc

segment of this essay to spell out

a

relational view of the indiv idua l self

which was, as a m i n i m u m , ituplicit in James’s thou gh t. Jud gin g wh at is “sat-

isfactory” or “satisfying”

for

such

a

self is im me nsely more com plex than

describing w hat

appears

to satisfy some imaginary or psychically isolated

ego. In a letter to Perry, written

a

few years before his de ath, Jam es ex-

pressed his dismay at being misunders tood.

T h e pragmatism that livcs inside of me is so different from that of which

I

succeed in wakening the idea inside

of

other

pcoplc,

that theirs makes me feel

like

cursing God and dying. When I sny that,

other

t k i t p

bcirlg c g t r n l ,

the view

of things that secms more satisfactory morally will Iegitin~atcly e t reated by

men

as

truer

than

the

view

that

secrns

less

so ,

they

prole

t t ~ ~

s

s a y i t ~ ~ q

hat

anything

morally

satisfactory c a n

be

treated as true,

no

matter how unsatisfac-

tory it may be from thc point

of

view of its consistency with whatw e already

know

or

believe to be true about physical o r natural

facts.

Which

is

rot (TC,

II:468)

BecauseJarnes’s

rclationalism was so often overlooked, his pragm atism is

reduced

to

such crude formulat ions as “any thing is t rue or

good

if it makes

som eon e feel good.” Inasm uch as emotion ally “feeling good”

is

but onc of

num ber

of

relevant factors

in

the s i tuat ion f an yndividual, itcan never serve

as the

sole

cri ter ion of wha t is judg ed

“good.”

James quiteexplicitly rejccted

such a view wh en he said that “w hat imm ediately feels m os t ‘good’ is not

always m os t ‘true,’ w h e n rneastrred 6 y the uerdict

oftlzr

rest o j e x p e v i e n c r . .

.

.

I f

merely ‘feeling good’

could

decide, drunk enne ss wo uld

be

the supremely

valid h um an expe rience” (VRE, 22; i talics added). T he sam e failure to ac-

kno wled ge the elational context that

ames

takes forgra ntcd results in reduc-

ing pragm atism tself to cru de ormulas: “w hatever w orks for the individual

is

good,”

for exam ple. in suppor t

of

such an interpretation on e m igh t cite

lames’s

claim that pragmatism’s “only test

of

t ruth is what works best i n the

way of

leading

us.”

What would be lef t out in suchn interpretation, hgwcv-

er, is the rest of the sentence in wh ichjam es adds som e ualifications: “ w ha t

fits every part

of

l i fe best and combines with thecollectivity o f experience’s

demands , nothing being omit ted” (P , 44; italics added). H e expresses the sam e

acknowledgment of the co m ple xity of evaluation as

follows:

“ l f t h e o f o ~ q i c n l

ideas prove t o have

a

vaiuefor concrete Ji Jk they wi l l be true, f o r yragrtratistlz,

it1

the

sense ofbeing

goadfor

so

t n u c h .

FOY

ow

much

wmre

they

are

trtte,

will

depend erlrirely

O H heir relations to f h e other trzrths that a h ave to be a C k t md e d g e d ” ( p , 40-41).26

I am not for a moment sugges t ing that Jameschieved such complexeval-

uation

of

any

of o u r

rcligious o r m or al bciiefs, and

I

am most certainly not

suggesting

that I will realize such achievem ent in what

follows. I

am sug-

gesting,however, hatwhatever shor tcomingsp r agm at i s m may have, it

cannot

properly be

charge d with taking the easy road to evaluation. Indeed,

it points toward

a

m ethod that for even partial reaiization would

be

im-

mensely dem anding and r igorous.

In

The

brietier

of

Religious

Experience,



James designated threc tests that are applicable to religious truth: immediate

luminousness, philosophical reasonablencss, and moral h elpfulness (VRE

23). Perry notcd that “thesc arc new name s for cri tcria of kn ow led ge w hich

appear repeatedly in

James’s

philosophy”

(TC,

1~ 334) .

n

A

Pluvulistic

Utai-

ueyse,

James said that “ratio nality has at least four dmensions, intellectual,

aesthetical, moral an d practical.” He addcd that “to find a w orld rational

to

the maximal dcgree

r l a l l

these respects

s imdtnneous ly

is no easy m atter.’’ T h e

task wo uld be to get “a con cep tion wh ich will yield thc largest balnrlce o f

rationality rather than o ne w hi ch will yicld pcrfect rationality of cvery de-

scription” ( P U , 55). Since I a m

suggcsting

that “pragmaticevaluation”

claims

to

be a m o d e of “rational” evaluation, thesc last texts serve to rein-

force m y claim that pragm atism, while affirming person al cxperience as its

ultirnatc touchstone, involves

a

divcrsity of subtle criteria in its effort to

rcach any concrete evahation of thc lived conscqucnccs of an dea, belief, o r

institution.

It

is againstuch back groun d resupp ositions that

I

willmaintain

throughout this

essay

that the wor th of any bclief in imm orta lity ( o r its

countcrbelief) must be evaluated in rclation to hum an cxpcricncc. Louis D u -

pr6 has sug gcstcd that

“ the

belief in life after death appcars to have gro w n

out

of

actual expericnccs more than

out

of

reasoning proce~ses .” ’~ Whether

or

not

Dupr@

s correct conce rning the origin

of

this belief, I

would

main-

tain that in thc past

i t

has been a significant belief on ly to the ex ten t that it

has bornedirectly o r indirectlyupon personalexperience.By he

s a m e

token, it has tended to become insignificant in proportion to its distance

f rom heongoing lives of humanbeings. A pragmatic nquiry nto he

nature and wor th of bclief

in

persona l imm ortality must, therefore, bring

forth the positive and negative, actual and implicit, conseq uence s

of

such

belief, Th is kind

of

approach, i t

is

impor tan t

to

note ,

is

not restricted

to

description, even assu m ing that such description could bemore nearly com-

plete than it ever is. Pr ag m atic inq uir y also includes a spe culative o r critical

component that suggcsts possibilities

for

a future course of action. Put s im-

ply,

on

the

basis

of the way things are an d have

been,

the pragm atist ven-

tures

a

guess as to

how

they m igh t be-“guessing” that takes the

mode

of

extrapolation.

PRAGMATIC

EXTRAPOLATION

Any effort

to

ta lk about

a

fu ture mode of the individual self

or

the

cosmic

proccss, o r even abo ut this process considered as

a

totality

o r

as a whole,

takes

us

beyond both direct experienc e and nferential reasoning , strictly

considercd.28

Such

a movement m ight be designated specu lation, irnagina-

tion, or the term em ployed here, extrapolat ion. Any pragmatic extrapola-

tion

of the future, as I have pointed

o u t

elsewh ere,29 mu st ulfill

at

least four

cond itions. First, i t mu st procee d from data given in experience. Second,

this

projected future must

be

plausible-that

is,

i t must not

be

in fundamen-



tal conflict with the data from wh ich it s an cxtrapolat ion. T hi rd , the futurc

state m u s t be sufficiently differcnt from the present statc o that the f utu re is

not me rely the present indcfini tcly extended. F ourth and most impor tan t ,

the

extrapolation m ust rcnder

our

prese nt lifc-in bo th

its

individual

and

com m un al aspects-morc meaningful, m o rc significant, and more rich.30

Since the goal of extrapolation in the prcsent endea vor is

to

produce

a

m d e 2 of the self and the cosm ic procc ss wh ich is ope n to immortal i ty , a

word should be said ab out how “m ode l” is to be unders tood. Ian Barbour

has givcn us an cxcellent description o f thc naturc and role

of

modcls in both

science and religion. A ltho ug h

I

cannot c la im Barbour for the pragmat ic

tradition-he calls him self a “critical realist”-I will ap pr op ria te so m e f his

language concerning models which

I

f ind eminently congenial to pragma-

Broadly speaking,

a model

is a sytnbolic represcntation of selccted aspects

of the bchaviour of a com plcs syste m for a r ticular purposes. I t is a n imagina-

t ive tool far ordinary experience, ra ther than a descript ion of the world. .

.

.

Models arc taken seriously

but

n o t literally. T hc y are nei the r literal pictures

of reality nor “useful fictions,” but partial and provisional

ways

of imag in ing

what is n o t obscrvablc; they arc sym bolic reprcsentat ion of aspects

of

the

wo rld wh ich are not directly accessible

to

us .

Models in religion are

also

analogical.

They

are organizing images used

to

orde r

and interpret pat terns of experience

in

h u m a n life. Like scientific mod-

els, they are neither literal pictures

of

reality nor useful fictiom. . . . Ult imate

models-whether

of a

personal

God

o r

a n

imp erson al cosm ic process-direct

a t tent ion to particular patterns in events and restructure the way on e secs the

world. ( M M P ,

6-7)R1

T he kind o f pragmatic mod el called for would not pretend to give

us

either

a

pictorial or

a

conceptual representation

of

reality. Its chief function

will be to enable us

to

participate m or e creatively in and w ith reality. Such

a

mo del mu st result from an extrapolative process that begins

in

and relates

back t o conc re te e~ p e r i e n ce .~ ’ike any pragmatic evaluation, i t will be sub-

ject to criticism in terms of consistency, cohercncc, and cont inu i ty ofcxpe-

riencc, but its ultimate worth will be determined

by

the qu ality of ife that i t

suggests, cncourages, and

makes

possible.33

PE RSONAL

I MMOR TALtTY

O n e f inal in t roduc tory poin t : thc conccrn of this essay is yersorral immor-

tality-by which is meant s imply and crudely the survival o f thc “I” or the

At least five other modes of immortality have been suggested: ab-

solute spirit imm ortality (we are imm ortal insofar as we are absorbed with

the Eternal Spirit , or the Everlasting God, o r t h e

O n e ) ;

cosmic im mortal i ty

(we

are

immo rtal insofar as we crnerge f rom and return to the

cosmos

o r

nature); ideal immortality(weare mm ortal nsofar as

we

participate

in

timeless values

or

eternal ideals); achievement im m or tal ity

we

arc immor ta l



th rou gh ou r creative acts

or

dceds); poster i ty immo rtali ty (wc arc i ~ n n l o r t a l

through our chi ldren, or the com mun i ty ,

or

the race).3s

N o w whatcver their differcnces and howcver v ah a b lc thcir rcspcctive in-

sights, thesc fivc m od es all have on e th in g in com mo n-the individual per-

son will cease to

bc,

hc o r she will be w ith ou t rernaindcr,

at

thc

m o m c n t of

death.36 M y con tentio n, in contrast tho ugh not totally in op po sition , is that

the loss involvcd in such modes ofyevsorzless inlmortal i ty is directly propor-

tional

to

the worth of the individual pcrson;

flirther,

fai l ing personal immor-

tality, that there are n o adc quate surrogates which can serve to allcviatc the

pain of loss . Assuming that human pcrsonsareprecious calizations of

nature or the cosmic process, th c failure to maintain thcse persons in that

m ode

of

individua lity upo n wh ich heir prcciousness dcp en ds

m a y

be

a

harsh truth to

be

endured

but

surely not to be celebrated. Finally, while

beliefs in im m ortality throu gh idcals, achievements, nature, hu m an kin d, o r

God havc becn k n o w n to and can continu e to inspire and cncrgize a por t ion

of humanity, the

exclusion

o f

the

individual person from these modes can-

no t bu t have a radically dirninishcd pragm atic efficacy for the ov erw hclm ing

numbcr of h u m a n beings.37

Further, the con tem po rary awareness of the proba ble obliteration, natu-

rally or hum anly induced ,

of

the earth and

its

inhabitants has dcprived

at

lcast three

modes

of imm ortali ty (cosmic, achicvem cnt, postcr i ty) of m u c h

of their attraction even for thcse sclcct grou ps . From am ong thc num erous

expressions of pessimism concerning the earth’s futurc,

it

will sufice to citc

two, one f rom a philosopher (Bertrand Russcll) and onc f rom a poet

(W.

B.

Yeats).

Tha t all the labor of th e ages,

all

the devotion, all th e inspiration, all the

noon-

day brightness of h u m a n

genius,

are dcstined to extinc tion in the vast death o f

the solar system, and that the whole temple of M an’s achievemcn t m ust inev-

itably be buried bencath the debris of a universe in

ruins-all

these things , if

not

quite beyond dispute, arc yet so nearly ccrta in, that no ph ilosop hy w hich

rejects them

can

hope

to

stand.3*

T h e wander ing

ear th

herself may be

O n l y a sudden f laming word ,

In clanging space a m o m e n t h e a r d ,

Troubling the cndlcss rcverie.39

Ther e is perhaps no more plaintive cry against any kind

of

immortal i ty

that excludes the individual person than the on e f o u n d in T f l e

Brorhevs

Ku-

ramarov:

“Surely 1 haven’t

suffered,

simply that I , m y crimes

and

my

suffer-

ings, may manure

the

so il o f t he f u tu r e h a r m on y , f o r s om ebody

Ise.

I want

to sec wi th m y ow n

eyes

the hind l ie do wn with the l ion and the victim rise

up and ernbracc

his

murderer . I wa nt to be there when everyone suddenly

unde rstands what it has all been

Ther c

is

a

certain irony here ,

of

course,

in

that Dostoevsky

puts

thcse



22 Introduction

words in the mouth of Ivan-the “unbeliever.”. Whatever Fyodor Dos-

toevsky’s overt belief, or overbelief, in personal immortality, his artistic ex-

pression is more ambiguous and more characteristic of the modern sen-

sibility. “There is only one supreme idea on earth,” he tells us in Diary ofa

Writer, “the idea of the immortality of the human soul, since all other ‘high-

est’ ideas man lives by derive from it.” Further, “without the belief in the

existence of the soul and its immortality human existence is ‘unnatural’ and

~ n b e a r a b l e . ” ~ ~nequivocal as this statement is, it cannot be taken in corn-

plete isolation from Dostoevsky’s literary expressions. As Ralph Harper

notes, “In spite of the superficial or thodoxy of Dostoevsky, he, not Nietz-

sche, was the first to outline the consequences of the absence of God and

i m m ~ r t a l i t y . ” ~ ~ne need not accept Harper’s evaluation of Dostoevsky’s

orthodoxy to acknowledge that no one could describe this absence

so

viv-

idly and sensitively unless he had in some fashion experienced it. This an-

guished ambiguity is, in my.view, the inevitable condition of those attempt-

ing to be responsive to contemporary thought and experience while

themselves believing in

God

and personal immortality.



P A R T

I

Personal

Imm

o

rta

it

y

:

Possibility ind

Credib

il ity



C H A P T E R 1

World or

Reality

as “Fields”

Now I will do no th in g bu t i sten,

To accrue what I hear into this song, to let sounds

I hear bravuras o f birds, bustle of

growing

wheat,

I heat the sound I love, the

sound

of t h e h u m a n voice,

1

hear

all

sound running toge ther , combined , fused

or

following,

I am cu t by bit ter and angry h ai l , I lose m y breath,

Steep’d amid honey’d morphine , my windpipe throt t led

A t length

let

up

again to feel the puzzle of

puzzles,

and that we call

Being.

contribute toward i t .

gossip of flames, clack

of sticks

cooking

m y meals,

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

in fakes of death,

“ W a l t Wh i t m a n

“Song

ofMysel f ’

We kn ow existence

by

participating in

existence. .

.

.

Existence then

is

the pr imary

d a t u m . But this existence is not my own

existence as

an

isolated self. If i t were , then the

existence of

a n y

Oth er wo uId have to be proved,

and it could no t be

proved.

What

is

given

is the

existence

of

a

world

in which we participate.

” j o h n

Macmurray

Persons

in

Relation

Som e years a go John J. M cD errnott sugg ested that i t was “ unfortun ate that

James

did not s tay wi th

he

language he ut i l ized in preparing

or

his Psycho-

logical Se m inary

of 1895-1894. A t

that t ime ,

he

resorted to the metaphor

of

‘fields’

in

order

to

account descriptively

for

the prim al activity o f the process

of experience.”’ While I share M cDc rmo tt’s view, m y concern here is no t

primarily to explicate

James7s

metaphysics in term s of fields b ut to utilize his

language

as well

as that

of

others to const ruct

a

“field” model , for whichmy

pr imary purpose is to em ploy i t in the developm ent of a “self’ open

to

the

possibility of personal immortality. Since a key feature

of

both the self and

the mode of immortal i ty I wish to sugges ts their cont inui ty wi th theexpe-

rienced world or reality, it will be nccessary first to present the distinguish-

ing

charactcristics

of

this wo rld, beg inning with “fields”

as

the pr imary

25



26 Persotlnl

Dnmortality:

P o s s i b i l i t y

ntrd

C r e d i b i l i t y

metaphor , in

an

effort to un de rsta nd all reality. It mu st be strcssed that t he re

is no pretensc of giving a mir ror imag e

of

som e outer “real i ty in i tself’

when reality

o r

the world is described as

a

plurality of fields. A pragmatic

approach co nsciously employs i ts pr imary terms m etaphorically, having as

i ts chief aim th e d evelop me nt

of a

metaphysical language that will serve

to

expand, deepen, and enr ich humanife through varied and diverse

modes

of

participation in reality, rather than claiming that such languag e gives us

a

conceptual “picture” of

a

reality cssentially ind ep en de nt of human exper-

ience.

Let me beg in with

a consideration ofJarnes’s notes

for

thc Psychological

Seminary, in w hic h “fields” is em ployed as the ccn tral category.’Jamcs con-

siders three supp osit ions neccssary “ i f .

.

. one w ants to describe the pro-

cess of experience in its simplest terms with theewest assumptions.’’ Bcfore

looking at these supposit ions, we should focus

n

the sentencejust cited. As

so

often

happens

with James, his graceful style and felicitous expression

mask the profound and complex ques t ion wi th which he is struggling. In

this instance, o f course, i t is no thi ng less than the perennially sim ple an d

recurring qu estion: “W hat is reality ?” Fo rJarn es, th is q ues tion, ike all ques-

tions, must be answered in terms ofexp erience , but that at tempt imm ediate-

ly gives rise to the allied qu estion, “W hat is experience?”

Now

one might concede that such ponderous ques t ions re the stock-in-

trade of tho se usually genial b u t often peculiar beings called philosoph ers,

but for those wh o live by “c om m on sense,” they are of little con cern. As I

have already indicated, though

few of

us-even those involved in the hilo-

sophical game-are metap hysicians in the full sense

of

that term, we are all

metaphysicians in the sense of thinking and act ing w ithin a set of ideas,

principles,

and

assumptions. W hen James and other pragmatis ts suggest

a

language shift , then, they are

ot

t ry ing

to

refute “c om m on sense”

so

m u c h

as they arc trying to m ake us aware of ways

of

looking

a t

reality that ar e

obstacles to richer ways of l iving. Whilc the concern of this cssay is

not

with

the technical specifics and the historical polemics in wh ich the prag m atists

were engaged, i t

s sei11

impor tan t

to

note that thcy were at tem pting to bring

forth ways of thinking that we re in sharp conflict with ma ny deep ly in-

grained perspectives a nd intellectual customs.

Th is is best illustrated, perhap s, by presenting James’s three “field”

sup-

posit ions and indicat ing someof the not ions to wh ich they are opposed.

( I )

“Fields” that “devclop,” undcr he categories of continuity with each

other-[categories

such as]:

sameness

and

otherness

[ o f ]

hings [or

f ]

thought

screams, fulfilln~ent f one field’s meaning inanother field’s content,

“postula-

tion” of one field

by

another, cognitionof one field by another, etc.

From the first part o f this sup po sitio n w e learn that reality is pluralistic

(“fields”), processive

“develop”),

and c ont inuous (“cont inui ty”) . I f

we add

“relationality,” w hic h is im pli ed in the categories described, w e have fou r

distinctive features

of

the world wi thin which

I

will develop m y views

o n



World

o r

Reality as “Fields”

27

the self and immortal i ty . For

the

moment it is suf ic ient to notc that what

s

imp licitly rejected by this field, o r proccssive-relational, view is a n y rcality

that

is

unchanging or unrelated.

(2)

But nothing postulated whose whatness

is

not

of

some

rwtltve

given in

fields-that is, not

of

field-stuff, datum -stuff, experience-stuff, content.

No

pure ego, for example, and

no

material substance.

In this suppo sition w c have James’s radical rejection of all modes

of

csscn-

tialism, whether rnatcrialistic, idealistic,

or

dualistic. Thc fuller implications

of this supposit ion will em erg e as the character and

rolc of

fields is de-

scribed, but it is alrcady evident that to view rcality as “fields” excludes any

underlying substance having universal

and

unchanging esscntial characteris-

tics.

(3) All the fields comnlonly

supposed

arc inconlpletc, and

point to

a complc-

nlent beyond their own content. T h e f inal content . . . is t ha t

of

a plurality

of

fields, morc or less ejective to each othur,

but

still continuous i n various ways.”

The impor tance

of

this suppo sition for my purpo scs cann ot be exagge-

rated. I t provides the ground for thc recognition of individuals

while

avoid-

ing any atomistic ndividualism

or

isolating egotism. While

all

fieldsarc

“incomplcte” and continuous with others , they are not

so

cont inuous

that

reality is reduced to an undifferentiated monistic flux. “Plural i ty” is just as

real as “cont inui ty ,” and whe n

we

add to these three sup po sitions James’s

latcr no tes that there is “around cvery ficld a w ide r field that supcrced cs

it . . . ( the t ruth of cvery moment thus lying beyon d itself),” we are pre-

sented with

a

wo rld that can be mo st succinctly dcscribed as “fields w ithin

fields

within fields.

.

. .” 4

“What

have w e

gained,”James asks, by substituting fields “forstable

things and changing ‘ thoughts’?”

We certainIy have gaincd no

stabiliry. The

result

is

an almost maddening rest-

lessness.

.

.

.

But we have gained concreteness. T h a t is, when asked what we

rneart by

knowing,

ego, physicai thing, memory, etc., we can

point

to a defi-

nite portion of content with 3 nature definitely realized, and nothing is postu-

lated whose na t u r e is not fully given in experience-terms.

T h e goal of “concreteness”-fidelity

to

concrete exp erience-would

ap-

pear

to

be

s imple and easy

of

realization,

but

it

is

deceptively

so,

as

a

diverse

group

of late mo dern and con temp orary philoso phers have at tested. John

He rm an Randall, Jr. , ma intains that metaphysics can best

be

described as

“the criticism of abstractions.” He further claims that this is

the metaphysical method

of

Bradley, Dewey, Whitehead;

of

the Hegel upon

whom

they all draw; of

the

continental post-Hegelians, criticizing the ‘lintel-

lectuahm” of the Hegelian tradition in the light of “life” (the LEber~rplrilosoylri~

of Nietzsche and Dilthey)

o r

Exisrcnr

(EGerkegaard); of

the phenomenol-

o g s t s ,

criticizing

the formalism

of

the Neo-Kantians

(Hussrrl) ,

and

of

the

existentialists (Heidegger, Jaspers, Tdich); of Bergson, opposing experienced



28

dllre‘t

t o “ T h e ‘t’ of physics,” and

of

W illiam James opposing “im me diate ex-

perience” to the emp iric ism of Mill; and o f m any oth er late nineteenth- and

early twentieth-century philosophies of exper ience5

Randall

is

no t sug ge sting that the specific features

of

the views o f such

a

variety of thinkers are identical

or

even always compatible. W hatever the

differences, however, the importance of their converging emphasis upon the

primacy of concrete experience and the rigorous reflection de m and ed for its

apprehension should not

be

minimized. Throughout this essay, therefore, I

will repeatcdly stress th e necessity o f relating any speculations, extrapola-

tions, or models to the experienced

world

within which wc live, think, and

act. W hat attracts me to James is his passionately relentless effort to be

as

faithful as

possible

to the range

and

varieties

of

experience. So m ethin g of

this cffort is expressed by Ralp h Barton Perry:

Thus by

the

inclusion of expericnces of tendency, meaning, and relatedness,

by

a recognition of the m or e elusive fringes, margins, and ransitions hat

escape a coirser scnsibility, or a naivepracticality, or an unconsciously ar-

tificial analysis-by-such inclusion, thc

field

of imm ediately apprehendcd par-

ticularity becomes a con t inuum

which

is qualified to standas the metaphysical

reality. (TC,

I:460)

A no the r im po rtan t aspect ofjamcs’s empha sis upon and quest for con-

creteness is its strongly pers on alistic charactcr. M an y

years ago,

Rober t Pol-

lock stressed this relation betweenJames’s conce rn for concrete reality and

his celebration of personal activity:

Evidently, forJames, pragmatism

s

an *‘attitudeof orientation” by which man

can achieve a vital contact with concrete reality and along innum erable paths,

by a iming not s imply a t the abstract relation of the mere on looke r bu t at a

relation hat is perso nal,directand m mediate ,and nvolvingparticipation

with

one’s

wholeheartandbeing. . . . James was endeavoring o ake se-

riously the fact that reality does not addre ss itself to abstract

minds

bu t to

living persons inhabitinga rea l wo r ld , to wh om t makes known some th ing of

its

essential

quali ty only

as

they

go

o u t to meet i t through act ion.

I t is

this

concrete relation of ma n and his world, realized in action. wh ich acco unts fo r

the fact that

our

power of affmnation outruns

our

knowledge, as w hen we feel

o r sense the truth beforc w e

know

i t . ToJames, therefore, pragmatism was

a

doctrine designed to enlighten the whole ofhurnan act ion

nd

to givc

meaning

t o

man’s

irrcpres sible need to act.6

O n e

final

point concerning the central i ty of concrcte cxperience

i n

the

thought ofJames has to do with diEerentiating his view f rom narrow and

excluding

modes of

empir ic ism. A text

from

Perry will suffice to un derline

the

open ness ofJarnes’s wo rld: “Th is fluid, interpenetrating field of given

existence,as James depicts i t , embracing the ins ight

of

rcligious mysticism

and

of

Bergsonian intuition, is far removed from the sensationalistic ato m -

ism

of

the

discredited empiricists”

(TC,

I:461).



M4rld o r

Reality

ns “Fields”

29

CHARACTERISTICS OF

“FIELDS”

Th ere is an inevitable circularity involved in discussing o r analyzing an y

alleged “ultim ate” cate go ry o f reality. For exam plc, f reality is bestde-

scribed in term s

of

“fields,” as is being sugge sted here, then

it

would seem

that we mu st describe fields themselves in terms o f

“fields.”

Since prag-

matism does no t aim a t o r believe possible any definitive conc eptual escrip-

tion

of

reality, ho wever, this circularity is neither vicious no r pa rticula rly

unsett ling. T he aim of pra gm atism is part icipation in, rather than abstract

representation of, reality. A ny circ ula rity involved in the analysis o f fields,

therefore, must be ju dg ed on i ts abil ity to expand and enrich experience in

both its cxplanatory and lived dimensions.

Bearing in

mind

that

“field”

is

a

metaphor and that images

r

concepts

are

employed in its analysisor the purposes o f insight andutilization rather than

definitive description, letm e touchbriefly upon thechief characteristics of

a

“field.” A field can be described

as

a proccssive-relational complex, but this

term would be g rossly m isleading

if

we imagined that “things” called pro-

cesses and “things” called relations have co m bin ed to m ak e

a

field. Nor is it

adequate to posit plurality o fprocesses that subseq uently enter intoelations

such that fields result. Give n the limitation of langua ge and its inevitable

tendency

to

reify and deternpo ralize reality, pe rhap s the best w e can

do

is to

express the con stitutio n of fields dialectically.

Hence,

w e must insist that

processes are relational and relations are processive. T h er e a re n o unrelated

processes and n o nonp roccssive relations. T h e concrete reality (actually eal-

ities) is always a un ity inv olv ing n ever changing multiplicity. D ep en din g on

the specific field, hesemultiple“elements”will

be

variouslynamed: for

exam ple, electrons, neutrons, and

protons

in the atom ic field; molecu les,

cells, and genes in the org an ic

field;

planets in the solar field.

N o w negativcly speaking, this field view rejects any “ultim ate” elem ents

o r atoms o r particles un de rstoo d as indivisiblc, impenetrable, unchangeable

units. This

does

no t, however, exclude

all modes

of metaphysical atomism.

Whitehead,

for

exam ple, maintains that “the ultimate me taphysical truth is

atomism. . . . But atomism does notexclude com plexity and u niversal rela-

tivity. Each atom is a sys tem of all thing^."^ Whitehead’s label for these

ultimate atoms is “ac tual entities,” which he describes as “d ro ps

of

cxperi-

ence, complex and interdependent” (PR,

28).

The

fieId metaphor that

I

am const ruct ing must acknowledge

a

character

of in terdependence both “within” and amon g f ie lds

(I

use quotat ion

marks

to call attention to th e relative character

of

“withinness”).

A n

adeq uate field

theory,

from

my perspective, must allow for a multiplicity

of

distinct indi-

viduals while avoiding anyenclosure or isolation

of

these individuals. A s the

James text with wh ich we be gan indicates, fields are continuous w ith

other

fields; hence there are noabsolute, definitive beginnings and endings of any

individual field. W hitehead expresses some thing of this continuity:

“ W h e n

we

consider thequest ionwithmicro scopic accuracy, ther e

is

n o

defi-



30 Personal Immortality:

Possibility mid Credibility

nite boundary

to

determinewhere hebodybeginsandexternalnature

ends.

.

. . T h ebo dy requires heenvironmen t nord er o exist.”8

Of

course, i t must be quickly added that discreteness is ju st as real and funda-

mental as continuity. We can no t sha rply m ark

off

the bord ers of an indi-

vidual f ield-there are no suc h bo rde rs to be m ark ed off, given that fields

insensibly shade in to o th er fields; nevertheless, fields really are distinct (n ot

separate)

from

each oth er, nd pluralism-not monism-is the meta-

physical view sug geste d here . Given this perspective, there m us t be

a

real

and significant sense in w hic h w e can speak of discrete individuals having

irreducible centers . This point will be extrem ely imp ortant to the view o f

the

individual self that will present, but for the moment wish to main ta in

thatwhateverdiscrete ea litiesexist, heyare

al l

characterized

by

being

“centers

of

activity.”

As

James expressed it inhis unpublished notes: “Be the

universe as much of

a

unit as you like, plurality has on ce for all br ok en ou t

wi th in it.

Efectiuely

there are cen tres of reference and act ion.

. . .

and these

centres

dsperse

each other’s rays” (TC, IE:764). In a similar ve in , D ew ey

states: “In a gen uine al thoug h not psyc hic ense, natural beings exhibit pref-

erence and centeredness.”S

N ote that Dewey does not eq uate c entered activity w ith psych ic activity.

To

the end, James l ir ted with panp sych ism, and there s a difference am on g

the comm entators as to wh ether or not he succ um bed . think that Dewey’s

approach

is the more fruitful and thus

would

sug ge st that panactivism is

a

more accuratedescription of reality han panpsychism. Panactivism ex-

cludes any completely passive entities or Whiteheadian “vacuous actualities”

and, while affkming centered act ivi ty s the ma rk of all real bein gs, restricts

“psychic” to a specif ic m od e

of such

activity. In

a

world of “fields within

fields,” of course,a field that has its o w n center of activitywillsimul-

taneously

be

a consti tuent

of

another field with its

own

ce nte r of activity.

This is mo st simp ly illustrated in the case of

an organism where the

indi-

vidual cells are cen ters

of

activity wh ile also constitu ting org an or tissue

fields, w hich in turn are consti tuents of the organ ism as a “w ho le,” w hic h

also has its distinctive center.

DEWEY’S “SITUATION”

While not

using

field language as his dom inant terminology, Dew ey does

present

a

m o d e

of

field

metaphysics.

A

briefconsideration

of

Dewey’s

meaning and use of “situation”wil1 illustrate this and am plify certain field

characteristics already introd uce d. D ew ey

suggests

that his use of the t e rm

“situations” antedated “the introd uctio n of th e field idea in physical theo-

ry.”l0 W hat is im po rtan t , however, is not priori ty of use but the utili ty of

Dewey’s situational view for the construc tion of an adeq uate f ield meta-

physics.

“Situation,” De wey ma intains, “stands for som ething inclusive of a large

num ber

of

diverse elem ents existing across wid e areas o f space and lon g



World or Reality

as

“Fields”

31

periods of t ime , bu t wh ich, nevertheless, have their ow n unity.”” Else-

where, Dewey empha sizes the non isolat ional character of situations, ob-

jects, and events . Objects and evcnts are neverexperienced

o r

known in

isolation “b ut on ly in connec tion with

a

contextual whole

.

. .

called

a

‘sit-

uation.’” Dew ey docs no t d en y the reali ty of objects and events but insists

that they are special parts, phases,

o r

aspects “of an environing experienced

world-a situation.” He nce, there is “always a j e l d in which observation

of

this

o r thar

object o r event occurs .”12

I me ntioned earlier that a field view must acknowledge interdependence

both wi thin fields and between o r a m on g f ields. Th is “interdep ende nce” is

m os t forcefully expressed in Dewey’s no tio n

of

“transaction.” In

1949,

he

coauthored

a

work wi th Ar thur

F.

Bentley

in

wh ich “transaction” wa s in-

troduced as a mo re apt term than “interact ion” for purp oses of describing

reality and knowing.

3

“Interact ion ” wa s judge d inadeq uate ecause i t con-

veyed the mp ression hatchange nvolvesactionbetween ubstantially

complete and un changing enti t ies. From

a

situational, contextua l, o r trans-

actional perspective there are no such indep end en t en tities; there fore ,

“in a

transaction, the com pone nts them selves are subject to chan ge. The ir char-

acter affects and

is

affected by t he t r an ~ a c t io n . ” ’ ~s ano the r com m enta to r

expressed it: “W ithin the vario us trarlsactional situations, th e related aspects

are ndeed m utu alandcom pletely nterdep ende nt , as hey are nany

‘field.’

” 1 5 Hence, when terms are “understood transactionally,

. .

. they do not

name i tems

or

characterist ics of org an ism s alo ne, no r d ohey name i tems

o r

characteristics of en vir on m en ts alone; in every case, they nam e the al t iv i ty

that occurs ofboth

together”

( K K , 71).

Reverting to field languag e, we can say that it is the “nature” ofevery

ield

to flow into or shad e off to o th er fields in such fashion that the fields so

related are mu tually constitutive

of

each other. T h is will

be

of

crucial im po r-

tance later, when I will extrapolate a relation between the h um an an d divine

fields that renders belief in personal imm ortality plausible. To prepare the

g r ound

for

this extrapolat ion, let me here

draw

upon Dewey’s i n s igh t f d

descriptions of the relationship between an organism and i ts environm ent.

Because this is, of course, a transactional relationship, what he says

about

it

can serve

to

reinforce points already m ade.

“We

live and act,” De we y tells

us,

“in connection w ith th e exist ing environment, not in connection

with

isolated objects”

( L ,

68).

W hen xperiences

viewed

as an organism-

environment transaction, this must not be understood as the co m ing to-

gether

of two

essentially co m ple te and separate realities-‘“organism”

and

“environment.” Indeed, we can now more aptly describe this relat ionships

between wider

and

narrow er fields that are

distinct

though not

separate.

T h u s

Dewey is led to

say

that

“an

organism does not

live

in a n environmen t , i t

lives by mea ns of an env i r onm en t” (L,

25).

W hen Dewey elsewhere speaks

of seeing “the organism

in

nature, the nervous system in the organism, the

brain in the nervous system, the cortex in the

brain,”

he

quickly adds that



“whcn thus secn they will

be

seen i t ] , not as marbles arc in a box but as

events are in history, in’ a m ov ing , gro w ing never finished

process”

( E N ,

295). h

I t

should

be

noted that “environment”

is

an open-ended term

as

Dewey

uses i t . “En vironm ent,”w e arc told,

“is

wha tever conditions interact with

personal needs, desires,purposes and capacities to create heexperience

which is had”

( E E ,

42).

Another aspcct

of

Dewey’s transactional cxperiencc

that I will utilize in m y latcr extrapo lation (though in

a way

that

would

probably

not

please

Dewey)

is his description of organic life as a process of

activity involving an en viro nm cnr as ‘ ‘ a transaction extend ing beyo nd the

spatial limits of the organism” (L,

25).

Th ro ug ho ut this section

I

have stressed the characteristic

of

transactional

mutuali ty among all related fields, and the following texts indicate how far

Dewey was willing to

push

this mutuality.

Adaptation, n fine, is as

m u c h

adaptation o the envirotmlent

to

our own

activities

as our

activit ies to the enviro nm ent.

17

Habitsare like

functions

inmanyrespects,and especially in requirin g

the

cooperation of organism and environm ent. B reathing is an affa ir

of

the air as

truly as of he lungs; digesting an affair of food a5 truly

as

of tissues of s t o m -

ach.

Seeing

involves

light

j u s t

a s

certainly as it does

the

eye and

optic

nerve.

Walking implicates the gtound

as

well as the legs;

specch

dem and s physical air

and hum an comp anionship and audience as well as vocal organs .

Honesty, chastity, malice, peevishness, courage, triviality, industry, irrcspon-

sibility are no t private possessions

of

a person. They are working adaptat ions

of

personal

capacities wi t h cnvironing forces.18

Such phenomena as are described in these and ot h er field-supportive texts

constitute in part the expe riential groun d from which

I

will extrapolate the

transactional character of th e relations between the divine and h um an fields.

JAMES’S

“ P U R E

EXP ER I ENC E” A S PRIMORDIAL FIELD

It is one thing

to

call attention to the dif icult ies of an o ntological dualism

and quite another to showhow

such

a dualism is to be overcome. Nowhere

is

this mo re evid ent than in James’s radical empiricism o r theory

of

pure

experience. Th is th eo ry s no tor iou s for its lack of cla rity , its inconsistencies,

and

its incom pleteness; to render it clear,

consistent,

and comp lete would be

a formidable achievement. l 9 No pretense of do ing this

or

even showing that

it spossible is here made. In kee ping with m y general approach, I will

consider James’s the or y of pure experience insofar as it can con tr ibute to the

construction

of a

field model

of

th e self. M o re specifically,

I

will indicate

those aspects

of

the pure experience doctrine that seem in conflict with an

adequate field metaphysics and those that are congenial with and supportive

of such a perspective.

We have already sugge sted hat James’s pri m ary philosophicalconcern



World

or Reality

U S

“ F i e l h ”

33

was to dcvisc Imethod that

would

enable us to have greater acccss

to

and

mo re intimatc participation in “the concrete”-which, as

I

have n oted and

will continuc to stress, is the feature of a

“fields”

model that most corn-

mends it t o the purposes

of

this essay.

A

quest for the concrete was the

dom inating mo tive in ames’s con struc tion

of

his thcory of pure experiencc.

Therc is an irony of sorts here in t ha t this is perhaps thc

most

technical and

vague of Jarncs’s do ctrines, and often ch aractcrized by that vcry “ab stract-

ness” which he frequcntly criticized in oth ers .

Of

course, James

is

not the only twentieth-ccntury thinker w h o in an

effort

to realize concrcte expericncc has

appeared

to bring forth the ir icst

of

abstractions. Hcn ri Bcrgson , Edm und Hu sserl , and M artin He idegg er im-

media te ly com e to m ind . On e mig htustifiably say

of

these thinke rs,

tnutatis

nlntarrdis,

w hat M cD errn ott said ofJames: “Hc does not utilize the notion of

‘pure cxperience’ to close off chc analysis of thc real bu t to giv c

i t

new

imp etus and send i t away from traditional but narrowcategories. Perhaps he

mea nt it as a heuristic device, as

a

sort of waiting game” (WW’, xlv). These

w or ds are equally applicable to the incipient ficId theo ry w hic h is the focus

of o ur concern. I wo uld add, and hop e to show, that had James employcd

morewidelyandconsistently

his

“field” ang uagerather hanhis “pure

experience” language, he w ou ld have better realized his goals while avoiding

some

unfortunate interpretations of his doctrine. A s already noted, howev-

er,

m y concern throughout my exp osi t ion ofJames’s doctr ines 1s not wi th

these doctrines in them selves but insofar as they, as I in terpret them , are

a

rich resource for doctrines of self and God that are con gen ial to and con-

sistent with belief in personal immortality.

James

was of the op inio n hat the traditional doctrines and assumptionsof

dualism, idealism, and materialism had run their course. W ith ou t de ny ing

that

each

had its insight and relative utility, he maintained that each

gave

rise

to problems that were unsolved and would remain insoluble unless certain

fundamentalpresupposit ionsweresurrendered.

T h e

key presupposition

was that mind and/or matter axe ultimate substanccs or essential modes of

being.

T h e dualist held that bo th are “reaI”; the idealist, that m ind alon c

is

“real”; thc materialist, that matter alone is “rea l.”

Of

course,

James

was no t

denying that mind and

matter

are

if

some sense “rcal,” but the metaphysical

question was,

“ I n

wh at sense are thcy real?” While i t is not qu ite accuratc

and ndeed, as weshall see, is ~n isl ca di ng , et

us

give

an

initialJamesian

response to this question within the frameworkof thc classical qucst for the

“rrrstof’

or ultimate character

of

reality. Thus we would

say

that reality is

ultimately neither m ind no r ma tter, neith er subjective nor objective,

but

is

instcad “pure experience”o r “ p u re xperiences.” We wo uld then account for

mind

and

rnattcr, subjective andobjective, in terms

of

pure cxpericnce,

sho win g ho w they are derived from this reality as a result

of

diverse func-

tions and relations.20

James p rcsented

his

doctr ine

of

pure expericncc in

a

series

of

essays

pub-



lishcd individually between 1905 and 1907and latcr collectcd under the title

E s s a y s i r l

Rndical

E n ~ p i r i c i s m .T h ou gh m uc h in these essays is technical, elu-

sive, inconsistent, and m isleading, a

few

texts from them, combined w i th

some un pubIished notes ,

will

be suf ic ient

for

my purposes.

In

a n unpublished note wri t ten around 3904,

James

indicatcs thc intention

of

his theory

of

pure experience.

By the adjective “pure” prefixed to the word, “experience,” I mean to denote

a form of being which is

a5

yet neutra l or ambiguous, and prior to the objcct

and

the subject distinction. m e a n

to

show that thc a t t r ibut ion e i therf

mental

or physical being to an experience

is

due

to

noth ing in the immediate stuff

of

which

thc experience is composcd-for the same stuff will scrvc for either

attribution-but

rather

to

two contrastcd

groups

of

associates with either

of

which

. .

. our reflection . .

.

tends to

connect

it.

. . .

Functioning

i n

the

wholc context of other experiences in one way, an cxpericncefigures as a

mental fact. Functioning in anotherway, it figures as a physical object.

I n

itself

it is

actually

neither, but virtually both. TC,I:385)

In his we ll-know n if no t we ll-understoodessay

“Does

Consciousncss Ex-

ist?” James con tends

that in

answering this question negatively, hc means

“only

to

deny that the word s tands or an entity, but to insist most emphat-

ically

that

it does s tand for a func tion. There is ,

I

mean,

no

abor iginal s tun

or quality of being , contrasted with that of wh ich material objects are made,

ou t of which our thoughts of the m are made” ( E R E ,

4).

Co nsiste nt w ith his perspective, jam es could also have written

an

essay

entitled “Does M atter Exis t?” Had he done so, he would have denied ami

affrrrned thc reality of matter in the same sense in which he denied and

affirm ed COI-ISCiOUSheSS. Ja m es d id no t w ri te such an essay, because he be-

l ieved that his point concerning matter as an ultimate substance had already

been ma de by

George

Berkeley:

“Cunsciolmess

as

ir

is

ordinnvily

trnderstood

does

r w t

ex is t ,

arly

more t h m does

Ma t t e r

to which

Berkeley

gave

the

coup de gr ice”

( E R E , 271).

Well, if ultimate reality

is

neither mind nor ma tter, wh at is it?

James’s

answer appears to be quite s imple: “Th ere s only one primal s tuff or rnate-

rial in the world, a stuff of wh ich ev erything is composed, and .

.

.

w c call

that stuff ‘pure expe rience’

”

( E R E ,

4). And elsewhere, af ter denying the

heterogeneity

of

thoughts

a n d

things, he adds: “ T h e y w e rttade uforte u r d

h e

same

stu

w h i r h

as such cannot

be d e j n e d

but

only

experietlced;

and

w h i c h ,

$one

wishes, one can call

the

stu$ofexpevience irr general” ( E R E , 271). T h e simplicity

of this answer, of course, is most deceptive, for in the sa me essay in w hich

he speaks

of

“private stuff,”he states that “there is n o general stuff of which

experience at large

is

made. There areas man y stuffs as there are ‘natures’ n

the

things

experienced”

( E R E ,

14).

Whether employed in the singularor the plural, the notionof “pure expe-

rience” gives rise to a host of dificulties and inconsistencies a t wors t , a n d at

best is grossly mislead ing wh en it is un de rstoo d

as

the ultimate substance(s)



Wurld

or

R e a l i t y as “Fields” 35

ou t of which

al l

things are made. Jamesm u s t unqucstionably be held at least

partially rcsponsible for this result, but it mu st be bo rne in mi nd that he

made n o pretense of having given a finished doctrine. Further, he was

per-

suaded

of

the

necd

to

break out

of

thc classical

CUI-de-sac,

and there is

a

decided exploratory and experimentalcast to all his writings conc erned with

pure exp erience. Some of the con fusion, I would

suggest,

arises from his

tendency to conflate the epistem ological and on tological pcrspcctives. I a m

not conten ding that hey can

bc

completely separated, but m ethodologi-

cally, at least, they

must be

distinguished.

Let us brieflyconsideranepistemological explanationandshow how,

when

this is tak en with ou t furth er qualification as an ontological explana-

tion,

we

land n

a

doctr ine hatwould

seem

to be unreconcilablewith

James’s ove rall philo sophy. After asserting “that there

is

only one primal

stuff’ and designating “that stuff ‘pure experience,’ ” James

goes

on to say

that “k no w ing can easily be explained s a particular sorto f relation towards

one

another into which port ions of

pure

experience

may

enter. The relation

itself

is a part

of

pure experience; one of ts ‘terms’ becomes the subject

or

bearer of know ledge, the know er, the other becomes the object known”

(ERE,

4-5).

It would

seem that,

for

Jame s, “pure experiences” beco m e ei-

ther physical o r psychical dep end ing on the co nte xt or elations into wh ich

they enter. Thus, he maintains, “experiences are originally of a rather single

nature.” W he n, however, these experiences “e nte r into relations

of

physical

influence . .

.

we make o f them a field apa rt w hich

wc

call the physical

wor ld .” W hen

they

enter into

a

different sct

of

relations,

when

“they are

transitory, physically inert, w ith

a

succession which docs

not

follow

a

deter-

mined order but seem s rather to ob ey em otiv e fancies, we m ake of t hem

another field which we call the psychical w or ld ”

( E R E ,

270).”

James

ex-

presses this sam e view conc erning the “neu tral i ty”

of

experiences consid-

ered in themselves in “HOWTwo Minds C an K now O ne Th ing” :

This

“pen,”

for

example,

is, in

the

first

instance,

a bald thnt, a datum,

fact,

phenomenon, content,

o r

whatever other neutral o r ambiguous

name

you

may prefer to apply. I call i t

.

. . a “pure experience.”

To

get

classed either as a

physical pen

or as

some one’s percept of a pen, it must

assume a f i w t i o n ,

and

that

can

only

happen in a

more complicated world.

( ERE, 61)’z

Whatever the

uses

th is doctr ine m ight

have

as

an epistemological

o r

phe-

nomenological expression, it is most inadequate

if

translated without quali-

fication into an ontological doctrine. A s such it suggests that reality in itself

is

a multiplicity

of

“thats” or “p u re experiences,” which are transformed

into mind or matter as a result of their relations and func tions.

A .

J. Ayer,

among o thers (beginning wi th Ber t randussell), labels this theory “neutral

rnonism.”*3RichardStevens co m m en ts that“Ayerseems to imply hat

James envisaged the units of p ur e experience

as

a series of ontologically

neutralbuilding

blocks

.

.

.

as elem enta ry ato m ic particles”

( J H ,

17-18).



While

I

think Stevens suggests

a

more fruitful interpretation

of

the doctrine

of p ure experience, there can be lit tle d o ub t that James gives go od gro unds

for nterpret ing his radical empiricism as

a

m o d e of “neutralmonism,”

thoug h this is quite eviden tly in conflict wi th oth er aspects

of

his philoso-

phy. James stated that “th e pu rc experiences

of

our ph i losophyare, in them -

selves considercd, so m any little absolutes” ( E R E ,

MI).’“

John W ild, corn-

m en tin g n this assage, no tes that as “littlebsolutes”hese “pure

experiences” w ou ld be “w itho ut relat ions to anyth ing outside.”Such

a

view,

Wild correct ly points out , wo uld ead to “that abstract atomism” that James

so often attacked. “How can this be reconciled,” Wild asks, “w ith the field

theory, according to w hic hevery focused experience is sur rounded by a halo

of

fringes

from

wh ich it canno t be separated except by

a

reductive abstrac-

I t is James’s desire to des cribe m ind empirically,

to

avoid locating it “out-

side” or“beyond”experience, that und oub tedlycontr ibu tes o he un-

acceptable interpretation of his doctrine of pure experience abeled “neutral

monism.” As a

minimum, therefore , wecan say (with Eliza beth Flower and

Murray G . M urp he y) that “th e po int he s m akin g is that experience is what

is given before any categorization at all-before the divisio ns of internal-

external, subjective-objective, apparent-real, and therefore certainly before

phenomenal-physicalndhcWhilet wo uld ot have “so1ved”’the

related pro blem s, Jam es m ight have at least avoided s om e of the confusion

to which his do ctrine of pu re exp erien ce has given rise

if

he

had

used the

mo re neutral term “field” or “fields” to

call attention

to

that inclusive

fea-

ture

of

reality

w i t h i n

which categorizations such as those

just

listed are con-

structed. I will return

to this

when discussing pure experience

as

“pr imor-

dial field,” b u t first

a

word should be said abou t the am biguityof experience

and

of

the term “expericnce.”

Stevens notes

“an

unresolved ambiguity” in James’suse of the term “ex-

perience.” In the Principles of Psychology, James mak es personal ownership

the first characteristic of consciousness: “It seems as if the elementary fact

were no t thought or this thought or that thought, but

w y

thought, every thought

being owned” (PP,

1221).

Stevenspoints

out, however,

that“elsewhere,

James seems to m ea n by ‘experience’ a kind of neutral and unowned given-

ness which is pr ior to the emergence of anyact of personal appropriation.

This linguistic am biguity may account for

the

obscur i ty which

seems

to

permeate his insufficiently articulated th eo ry of pu re xperience”

CJH,

92).*’

Jame s m ight well reply that the terminological ambiguity

is

gr ounded in

experiential ambiguity. Several texts fro m his essay “ T h e Place of Affec-

t ional Facts” will indicate the direction such a response might ake.

tion’”’5

Th er e is no

original spirituality o r materiality

of

being, intuitively discerned,

then;

but only a

translocation

of

experiences

from one

world

to

another;

a

grouping

of them with one set o r another

of

associates for definitely practical

or

intellectual ends

( ERE,

74).



World

or

Reality ns “Fields”

37

If “physical”a n d “mental” meant two differentkinds of intrinsic nature, im-

mediately, intuitively, and infallibly discernible, and each fixed forever in

whatever bit of experience it qualified, one does not see how there could have

arisen any room for doubt or ambiguity. But if, on the contrary, these words

are words of sorting, ambiguity

is

natural.

.

.

.

The obstinate controversies that have arisen . .

.

prove how hard it is to

decide by bare introspection what it is in experiences that shall make them

either spiritual or material. It surely can be nothing intrinsic in the individual

experiences. It is their way of behaving towards each other. Their system of

relations, their function; and all these things vary with the context in which

we find it opportune to consider them. (ERE,76-77)’*

Had James utilized his field language in the considerations expressed in

these passages, I think he would have retained his focus upon the concrete,

would have taken account of the ambiguity and fluidity accompanying such

terms as “physical” and “mental,” “spiritual” and “material,” while safe-

guarding his doctrine against any metaphysical atomism or metaphysical

dualism. This would have necessitated, however, affirming relation, func-

tion, context, and the like as fundamental features of all realities rather than

additions to some ultimate realities designated “pure experiences.”

But if we do not understand “pure experiences” as irreducible meta-

physical atoms, how are we to understand this doctrine? Charlene Seigfried

makes a most helpful suggestion by noting that James has submitted “pure

experience” as a supposition or hypothesis. Further, she points out that to

use “the words ‘stuff and ‘material’ in connection with pure experience is

misleading. It is not a clay-like iiratevia

yrinza

out of which other things are

fashioned” (CC,

39).

Seigfried goes on to say that “James is not asserting a

metaphysical sub-stratum”

(CC,

40).

but is presenting pure experience as

a

hypothesis that “gives a better explanation of knowing, of subject and ob-

ject, thought and thing, perception and conception, than does the alternate

hypothesis of primordial dualism”

(CC,

50).

If pure experience is taken

as

a hypothesis, we are faced with the rather

peculiar consequence that it is neither “pure” nor “experience”: that is, as

“pure” it is not experienced, and as experienced it is not pure. Let me try to

indicate the difficulty by considering texts where James does appear to claim

instances in which experience can be had in its purity.

The instant field of t he present is always experienced in its “pure” state, plain

unqualified actuality,

a

simple

that,

as yet undifferentiated into thing and

thought, and only virtually classifiable

as

objective fact or

as

someone’s opin-

ion about fact. ( E R E ,

36-37)

The instant field of the present is at

all

times what I call the “pure” experience.

I t is only

virtually

or potentially either object or subject as yet. For the time

being, it is plain, unqualified actuality or existence,

a

simple

that.

( E R E ,

13)



38

Persorial

Immortality:

Possibility

atid

Credibility

The inclusion of tensed language in these passages- “as yet,” “for the time

being”-suggests an interpretation fraught with great difficulty: namely, the

positing of an existential “that” which is not

a

“what.” The difficulty would

seem to be compounded if we posit a multiplicity of heterogeneous “thats,”

for this would seem to imply that, for example, the pure experiences

of

“pen” and “table” are differentiated in the absence of any essential (what)

differentiating characteris ics. Despite his language, therefore, James would

not seem to be saying that literally there is a time in which we grasp a “that”

which is chronologically prior to our grasping it as a “what.”

The closest he comes to saying something like this is in the following text:

“Only new-born babes, or men in semi-coma from sleep, drugs, illnesses,

or blows, may be assumed to have an experience pure in the literal sense of a

that

which is not yet any definite

wh at ,

tho’ ready to be all sorts of whats”

( E R E , 46). The operative phrase here is “may be assumed,” for while (as I

will shortly indicate) there are some experiential grounds for this assump-

tion, its hypothetical or suppositional character must be constantly kept

in

mind. Seigfried is again helpful here, for after asking in what sense pure

experience can be spoken of meaningfully if it is never “pure as experi-

enced,” she replies, “I think that it can be as a limit concept which enables

James to dethrone dualism as the primordial beginning

of

all experience”

(CC, 49). Seigfried goes on to refine the nonexperiential character

of

pure

experience:

James does not say that pure experience is never experienced, but that it is

never immediately experienced and communicated as such because as soon as

anyone

is

conscious in a human sense, he already structures that consciousness

according to conceptual and verbal categories. Pure experience is indeed the

immediate flux of life which furnishes the raw material to later reflections,

which is inextricably intertwined with conceptual categories.

(CC,

51)

In pointing out that the “immediate flux of life” can be experienced but not

communicated, she is indicating what I believe to be one of the more fruitful

features of James’s radical empiricism. Attention was earlier directed to

James’s claim that experience exceeds logic, that verbalization and concep-

tualization-however necessary and useful-are never adequate to nor ex-

haustive of the concrete flow of e~perience.~~hen the doctrine of pure

experience is grasped as an effort to keep us open and present to reality in its

overwhelming richness, depth, and experience, the difficulties previously

noted are not removed but become peripheral and secondary. Even, then, if

“pure experience” can never be experienced “as such,” postulating it serves

the purpose of keeping

us

aware of the fact that categorizations, concep-

tualizations, theories, and the like are not mental representations of concrete

reality. The further recognition that categories, concepts, and theories are

derived from a wider, everflowing field gives a measure of “experiential”

justification for postulating pure experiences that are neither physical nor



World or Reality as “Fields”

39

mental, subjective nor objective, spiritual nor material. In this way dualism,

idealism, and materialism are, if not disproved, at least shown to be them-

selves derivative modes of human thought and experience.

It is, however, when pure experience is treated as

a

primordial flowing

field(s) that it offers the richest possibilities for a field metaphysics. The

phenomenological grasp and description o f this field as the immediately

given or immediately present or immediate appearance is congenial to a

speculative effort toward the construction of a metaphysics of fields. While

it is not their principal concern, both Stevens and Seigfried in their analyses

of pure experience can be useful in the development of such a metaphysics.

Though it is merely a matter of emphasis, I wish to rely on Stevens in

describing the “givenness” of this primordial field and Seigfried in stressing

its flux or processive character. In both instances, o f course, relations are

inseparably present.

Stevens maintains that James’s “resolute return ‘to the data of experience”

is a “rediscovery of an absolute sphere of givenness, which antedates every

entitative distinction” (JH, 15).30 f the “original field of givenness, i.e., the

data of pure experience,” is rigorously analyzed, we do not discover the

dualistic “distinction between a subject-entity and independent-Object en-

tities.” We find “only interrelated patterns of givenness”

(JH,

68).31

As

an

“absolute sphere of givenness, which embraces both mind and body, con-

scious states and their contents,” pure experience cannot be reduced to or

identified with “a subjective stream” JH,

2).

Hence, as we saw earlier,

“pure experience is intrinsically neither objective nor subjective, but a larger

area within which the &nctional differences between consciousness and the

physical world can be defined.” As Stevens notes, this “larger area” or pure

experience

is viewed by James as “a neutralized sphere or field” (JH,

10).

One further point concerning this primordial field is noted by both Ste-

vens and Wilshire: namely, the phenomenological, though not necessarily

ontological, self-sufficiency and self-containedness of this field. Stevens

contends that “the whole purpose of James’s theory of Radical Empiricism

was to promote the discovery of an absolute field of experience, a zone of

pure givenness which would depend upon nothing beyond itself for justifi-

cation”

( J H , 115).

In a similar vein, Wilshire writes:

I think that James’ notion

of

the “originals of experience,” which he develops

in the

Prirrciples,

is the root-no tion

of

his later m etaphysics o f pure experience.

T h e key idea of that me taph ysics is that experience is pu re in the sense that “it

leans o n nothing”-it is the self-contained fou nda tion. A pure experience is a

“specific nature”-a “fact” in the sense that it has an irredu cible m eanin g, not

in th e sense that i t is necessarily a tru th a bou t the actual physical w orld. (

W’P

167)

Let me suggest now how this primordial given might be expressed in

more speculative and metaphysical field language. Suppose we postulate



40

Persorid Immortality: Possibility atid Credibility

pure experience as a primordial inclusive field(s) capable of being differenti-

ated into distinct fields such as the mental and the physical. Since both the

mental and the physical are within the field of pure experience, there is no

ultimate ontological dualism. This in itself, of course, does not tell

us

what

it is that determines fields to be physical or mental, but it keeps

us

focused

upon concrete experience in our effort to make such determination. By hav-

ing to make any distinction such as mind and body, subjective and objec-

tive, spiritual and material in terms of distinct functions and relational pro-

cesses, we are enabled to continually expand our awareness of the concrete

while not confusing it with any theoretical entities such as sense data, phys-

icochemical atoms, ideas, and the like. Any distinctions made will be recog-

nized as derivative rather than ultimate and will have to be justified in terms

of their experiential fruitfulness rather than as allegedly mirroring or corre-

sponding to different ontological entities or orders of being. By grasping

reality or experience relationally rather than atomistically, we are led to rec-

ognize both its continuities and its discontinuities. By grasping it pro-

cessively, we avoid locking reality into one form or another but instead

recognize its characteristics of shifting, overlapping, fusing, and separating.

A s I indicated in the general discussion of “fields,”

a

larger field is always

constituted by narrower fields that are both continuous with and distinct

from the wider field. This wider field is homogeneous, being neither re-

ducible to nor simply identical with its narrower fields. Since the wider

field, like all fields, is dynamic, it is continually giving rise to new fields.32

Hence, for example, one “portion” of this field acting upon another gives

rise to

a

distinction that can be designated as knower and known, or mean-

ing and content, or subject and object. The important point in terms of

James’s radical empiricism is that there is no need

to

go outside or beyond

experience (ever widening field) to account for “real” distinction and dif-

ference of function

of

one portion of this field (experience) upon another.

They are really distinct because they are two different functions involving

two distinct sets of relations, but they are not ontologically different because

they are and remain two different functions of the

same

experience (field).33

Just as important as the “givenness” character of the primordial field(s) of

pure experience is its “flux” character. James’s recognition of and emphasis

upon the processive, changing, or developmental features of reality are pre-

sent in his earliest writings, but only in his final years does he draw out the

full metaphysical implications of the experience of reality as changing. For a

period of about two and a half years between 1905 and 1908, James recorded

his reflective efforts to meet certain criticisms of his doctrine of “pure expe-

r i e n ~ e . ” ~ ~n

a

1906 note, James raises against himself a crucial question:

“May not my whole trouble be due to the fact that I am still treating what is

really a living and dynamic situation by logical and statical categories?” He

goes on to say that “if life be anywhere active, and if its activity be an

ultimate characteristic, inexplicable by aught lower or simpler, I ought not



World

or

Reality

ns

“Fields”

41

to bo afraid tw postulate activity”

(TC,

II:760). In

his

Hibbert Lecturcs-

delivered in 1908-09 and Iatcr published under the title A

PItdrulistil

Uni-

verze-James, cn coura gcd by

his

enco unter with Be rgson, bites the meta-

physical bullet and makes “flux” the heart of his metaphysics. In

doing

so,

he does no t den y-th e utility and ecessity of concepts and conceptualization,

but

hc

explicitly rejects their ability to give

us

reality

i n

its “thickness.” He

readily gra nts that irect cquaintance nd onceptual kn ow led ge re

complementary,

but if, as rnctaphysicians,

we

are more cur ious about the inner

ature of

reality

or

about what

really

mrnkes

it

go,

we

must

t u rn

o u r

backs

upon

our

winged

concepts altogether, and bury ourselves in thc thickness of those

passing Ino-

rnents

over the surface of which they fly, and on particular points of which

theyoccasionally rest andperch. .

.

. Dive

back

into thc flux i tself, hen,

Bergson

tells

us, if

you wish to

k t m reality, that flux wh ich Platonism , in its

strange

belief that

only

t he imm utab le is excellent, has always spurned; t u rn

your

face

toward sensation, that flesh-bound thing w hich rationalism has al-

ways loaded

with

abuse. ( P U , 112-13)

James goes

o n

to say that “the essence

of

l ife is i ts c ontinuo usly chan ging

character,” and it is this distinctive feature of reality as given “in the perccp-

tual flux wh ich the conc eptual translation so fatally leaves

o u t . ”

Since “ o u r

concepts are all discontinuous and

fixed,” we

can make them coincide wi th

life on ly by sup po sin g that life intrinsically contains “positions of arrest .”

This dart to make our concepts congruent wi thife o r reality is doomed to

fail, since “ yo u can n o more dip up the substance

of

reali ty with thcm than

you can dip u p wa ter with

a

net, however finely meshed”

( P U , 113).

Th is “flux ” em ph asis s already present in James‘s do ctr ine

of

“p ure expc-

rience”:

in

“T he T hin g an d ts Relations,” published early in 1905, he states,

“‘Pure experience’ is th e na m e wh ich I gave to the imm ediate f lux

of

lifc

which furnishes the material to o u r later reflection w ith its conceptual cate-

gories” ( E R E , 46). I earlier called attention

to

Seigfried’s suggestion that

“pure experience is

a

l imit co ncep t, an explanatory hypothesis which can be

postulated but no t expcricnced

as

such.”

Given

the definition of pure experi-

ence

“as

the instant field o f the present, the imm ediate flux of life before

categorization,” she furth er po ints ou t that “th e s trea m of consciousness

provides an experiential correlate wh ich comes closest to pure expe rience

and therefore is a useful mo del for explicating the m ore ob scu re hy po th-

esis.” A

fruitful consequence of “propos ing

a

cont inuous , unbroken flux as

the basic paradigm o f experience” is that

we

will thereby “be induced in our

ordinary, interpretcd experienc e to takc continuity

and

flux seriously and

will,

consequ ently, experience the transitions and

not be

fixated o n the ob-

jectified world” (CC, 51-53).3s

James’s evident conce rn-indeed passion-for the co nc rete in no way di-

minishes the irnportancc of conce pts, abstractions, theorics, symbols , be-



liefs, and the

like;

rather it increases thcir importance so lon g as we continue

to recognize

that

these are not ends or e ntitiesn thcnlselvcs bu t processes o r

activities by wh ich we are cnab led

to

participate ever more fully in that

ong oing reality wh ose dep th can

be

touched and ap preciated but never ex-

hausted through either perception or conception.

Later, with specific reference

to

personal imm ortal ity , the impor tant im-

plications and consequences of this continuingdialectic between the human

field(s) in its individual and collective mo des and the wider

icld(s)

of reality

will be explored.

For

now, let

m e

call attention to th ccharacter of “activity”

as belonging t o

all

fields. “Bare activity,” Seigfried points o u t, “is predicable

of

the world

of

pure

expe rience.” Such distinctions as actor

and

acted upon,

cause and effect, d o n o t apply to experience in its imm ediacy , thoug h they

can qui te proper ly be int roduccd “when theield of expcricncc is enlarged.”

Seigfried contends-quitecorrectly, I believe-that “the m ean ing of .ac-

tivity, in its immediacy, is ju st thcsc experiences of pro ce ss, ob stru ctio n,

strain and release” (CC, 96). This phenom enological descript ion seems to

me suppor t ive of

a

metaphysical cxtrapolation that would postulate activity

as characteristic o f all realities. As mentioned above, panactivism rathcr than

panpsychism would seem

o

be

a

m ore fruitful way o f characterizing James’s

metaphysics,dcspite his ow n language.BruceKuklick nterprets A Plir-

ralistic Utriverse as an affirmation of panpsychism and a rejection of neutral

I

find Kuklick closer to James’s tendency on this ma tter than

Perry, w h o 1amentsJames’s co m pro m ising the “th eo ry that mind is a pecu-

liar type of relat ionship amo ng term s w hich n themselves are neither phys-

ical nor m enta l , . .

.

through ident i fying the cont inuum

of

experience with

consciousness great and small” (TC,11592). It is ju st this identification that

Kuklick reads as expressive ofjarnes’s view

as

expressed in his last philoso-

phy. Having got ten beyond conceptualization, James

found

that “neutral

experience

w a s

n o w not neutral, b u t throbbing,

alive,

constantly coalescing

and recoalescing.

This

conscious experience was

not

unitary but contained

ever-widening spans of consciousness within some

of

which human con-

sciousness might lie” ( R A P , 333).

This

not ion

of

“ever-widening spans of consciousness” is most impor tan t

for the purposes

of

this essay. I t is not necessary, however,

to

posit spans of

consciousness as coexten sive w it h reality. H ere aga in, field languag ecan

keep us open to this feature of reality without universalizing it and giving

rise

to the problem s attached to panpsychism.

To

employ Kuklick’s lan-

guage, we m igh t say that

a l l

fields-from electronic to divine-are “th ro b-

bing, alive, co nsta ntly coalescing and recoalescing.” T he re is n o need, how-

ever, to c onclud e that all

fields

are “conscious” as lon g as we

do

not ,

a

priori ,

identify “consciousness” and “activity.”

Further,

there

is

an ambigui ty in he

way

Kuklick em plo ys the term “n eutr al .” Wh ile “p ure experience’’ can be

neutral as rega rds the physical o r psychical, it ca nn ot be ncutral as regards

process and relation. B y this I me an that pure experience is

open

to man-



World or

Renlity as “Fields”

43

ifestation as either physical

or

psychical, bu t i t

is not

open to being non-

processive o r nonrelational. Sincc

a l l

ficlds, as we have seen, are processive

and relational,

hence

“c on sta ntly coalescing and recoalescing,” reality has

a

continuity and

commonness

that

exclude

ontological dualism. Since, how-

ever, the processes

and

relations constituting

any

field

are

multiple and var-

iegated, we avoid any m onis m , affirm ing instead rnctaphysical

plural ism.

Our

distinguishingconsciousfields

from

nonconsciousfields, herefore,

must be based upon distinct functions rather than ultimately different kinds

of

being.



C H A P T E R 2

Toward

a

F i e l d

Model

of the

Self

What an abyss of uncertainty, whenever

the

mind

fcels

overtaken by i r s e l ~

when

i t , the seeker, is

a t

the

same time the dark

region

through which i t

must

go seeking

and

where all equipment

will

avail it

nothing.

“Marcel

Prous t

Retnemhrmce sf

Things Past

When I find myself, I

always find

that

self

coexisting

with

something

facing

that

self,

something in front of it

and

opposing it; the

world or the circumstance,

the

surroundings.

I t

is certain that this something does not exist by

itself, apart from

me.

.

.

.

But neither

do

I

ever

exist alone and within

myself; m y

existing

is

coexisting with that which is not

I .

Reality, then,

is

this interdependence and coexistence.

-Jose Ortega y Gasset

Some

Lessorrs

in Metaphysics

It is, perha ps,

a

suggest ive irony that

we

live in an age characterized

by

bo th

an obsessive concern for the ego or individual self and

a

denial that th ere is

any such reality.

The

first characteristic is man ifest in the charges that con-

temp orary expe rience is best described as narcissistic,

o r

that the present

generation is the

“ m e ”

generation,

or

that ours

is

a hedo nistic culture in

w hi ch self-satisfaction is

the

do m in an t if no t exclusive value. T h e denials of

the ego o r the individual self co me from the more intellectually sophisti-

cated segments of the comm unity, taking such various forms as

Buddhist

“no-self” doctrines

and

structuralist nddeconstructionistmovements.

Both perspectives have vaIidity not

only

as d escriptions but, mo re imp or-

tant,

as

expressions

of

significant human concerns, neither

of

which

can

be

ignored in a n y effort to const ruct a viable view of

the

human self. Yet the

sharp co ntr as t an d conflict between these apparently op po se d perspectives,

combined with the mult ipl ici ty

f

technical problem s inv olved, should tem-

per any hopes for

the emergence in the near

future of

anything approaching

a

definitive doc trine of the self. “ Ev cry thing one says about the self,” as

Ralph Harper perceptively notes , “should be regarded

as

tentative, born in

swirling mists

of

conflict and self-conflict.”l

Such

a

cautiona ry warn ing is

44



45

even m o re nccessary in an cffort wh os c dclibcrate p urp os e is the construc-

tion of

a

model

of

the self

that

is open to the possibility of immortal i ty or, as

a

bare min im um , do es no t conclusively excludc a belief i n imnlortal i ty o r

resurrcctlon.

C O N C E R N I N G A “F lEL l )

M O D E L ” FOR

T H E “SELF”

M y modest but s t i l l dat ively ambi t ious a imhcre is not

to

present

a

“theo-

ry” of the sclf, or even

a

“m od el” in thc mo re technical and developed sense

of

these tcrms, but rather

to

describe the broad outlines

of

what

a “field-

sclf” ought to involve. The developmentanddetailedfilling-out of this

sketch

would necessitate relating an d ap ply ing it

to

a

variety

of

disciplines

and

areas of human experience.

For

exam ple, i t

would

be necessary to

relate

the constructed model to data and theo ries in physics, chemistry, biology,

psychology, and sociology. Further, o ne w o ul d have to sho w that this mo del

is suggestiveand lluminating as regards moral, political,and eligious

que st ions. M ost imp ortant wo uld be to indicate how i t mig ht

allow

for

fruitful transactions betwee n a nd am on g thos e vario us disciplines and dis-

tinct spheres of experience. A s with any theory or mod el, therefore, a field

model

o f the

self

w ou ld have

to

be

tested and then

developed,

modif ied,

or

rejected in terms of its experiential fruits. This testing, of course, is really

a

collcctive, long-run testing an d is no t

to be

realized by any individual o r

restricted group of individuals.Indeed,within

thc

pragmat icf rame, he

most that could be hoped for would

be

a relatively complete confirmation in

the form of an ever expanding and enriching dialectic between cumulating

diverse data an d the relatively stab le bu t ever develop ing ficlds that con-

stitute the self.

T h e

open-ended character of such an cndcavor is in kecping

with

the

kind

of

world already described.

The

most that can be claimed for w hat

folIows

is that it suggests a direc-

t ion and som ething of w hat m igh t be achieved b y the utilization of the

“fields” m ctap ho r in relation to the h um an self. As such, i t might be desig-

nated

anontological

o r

metaphysicalspeculat ionwhich houghdistinct

from m us t also be consistent with

both

empirical and p henorncnological

inquiries.Needless

to

say, such a speculationneithersupplantsnor sub-

stitutes

for

either

of

these activitics. Finally, a particular concern

of

this spec-

ulation will be

to open up ethical and religious possibilities an d indicate

how

these activities might be just if icd.

Even in this rather vague, initiating stage of speculative inquiry, however,

one must do m or e

than

advance airy generalizations or gratui tous h ypoth-

eses.

Hence, the model constructcd must

be

“reasonably” coherent and con-

sistent; that is, it must not involve gross illogicalitics, and i t mu st not be in

conflict with well-attested an d firm ly gro un de d data from the va riou s ntel-

lectual disciplines. Further,

i t

m us t flow f r om , be consistent with, and help

develop the processive-relational w orl d that is being presupp osed.

In

sum,



46

Personal Immortality: Possibility and Credibility

in keeping with the assumed pragmatic perspectiire, this model of the self

must

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

do-or at least allow for the possibility of doing-the following:

preserve individuality without falling into atomistic individualism

or egocentric isolationism;

account for change, growth, and development;

account for a range and diversity of relations;

account for continuity, identity, sameness, and difference;

account for a variety of structures or dynamic systems such as the

psychological, personal, historical, cultural, social, and religious;

indicate how individuals

both

make and are made by language, his-

tory, art, science, religion, and other institutions;

allow for creative participation in wider processes or fields;

allow for radical transformation without obliteration or absorption

into another reality or process.

Now what, it might be asked, does such a self have to do with immor-

tality or resurrection? The claim made is that such a self is not necessarily

prohibited from continuing its reality and activities beyond the parameters

of what is customarily described as

“this world.” At the same time, any

concern for immortality must be shown to deepen and intensify rather than

diminish participation in the “here and now.” Hence, given the kind of

world or reality already described, continuance in

a

new life is not in itself in

conflict with such participation. The kind of world, therefore, in which

personal immortality is

a

possibility would be a richer and more variegated

world than one from which it is definitively excluded.

SELF

AS

“FIELDS

WITHIN

FIELDS

. . .”

Let me try to describe this self explicitly

as

“fields within fields.

.

. .”

I

want

to suggest that a self is composed of submicroscopic, microscopic, mac-

roscopic, and ultramacroscopic fields. Without any pretense to an ex-

haustive enumeration, we can list the following fields as continuous and

overlapping but nevertheless distinct. Among the submicroscopic fields

would be found atoms, electrons, neutrons, protons, and whatever may be

the latest particles designated by the physicists. Cells and molecules are, of

course, microscopic fields, themselves constructed of the submicroscopic

fields just mentioned. We enter the realm of macroscopic fields when we

focus on organs such as the brain, heart, and liver as well as muscles and

bones. Again, these macroscopic fields are constituted by distinctive cell

fields and in turn constitute the individual organism, itself

a

macroscopic

field. At this point it might be useful, to distinguish between “inner” and

“outer” macroscopic fields that enter into the reality of the individual orga-

nism. Those just listed would, of course, be “inner”; among the “outer”

would be atmospheric and environmental fields such as oxygen, hydrogen,

water, foodstuffs, and other organisms. We move into the realm of ultra-

macroscopic fields when we locate the multiplicity of macroscopic fields



Toward a Field Model ofthe Self

47

within the earth field. This field in turn is located within the solar field,

which is within the galactic field, which is within the universe field, which

is within . .

. .

To this point the description of the self is most uncontroversial, but it is

also most incomplete: uncontroversial because

I

have included only those

fields whose “observability” and “reality” evoke a high level of consensus;

incomplete because

I

have not included those fields that most distinguish

human selves from other organic fields. When we focus on any human or-

ganism, we are compelled to acknowledge additional fields: the uncon-

scious, the dispositional, the conceptual, the social, the personal, the cultur-

al, the religious, the historical, and the like. I have deliberately avoided

labeling these fields as physical and psychological or mental, in order to

avoid any ontological dualism. It may be useful later to reintroduce such

distinctions as functional categories; for the moment, however, I wish sim-

ply to stress that all these fields are real and interdependent, and are involved

in the structure of the self. Any reductionism that would give an ontological

priority to any field or group of fields is unacceptable. This is not to say that

all these fields must have the same degree of intimacy in relation to the self.

Whether they are all inseparable from the reality of the self is a speculative

question that must be addressed later.

For the moment, it will suffice to describe the various aspects characteriz-

ing the self from the field perspective. When James speaks of the self as “all

shades and no boundaries,” he is

rejecting any encapsulated self-any self

enclosed within the envelope of the skin or in some inner ego or mind.2 As

John Herman Randall, Jr., has noted: “It is indeed amazing that students of

man should ever have convinced themselves that the mechanisms of human

behavior are located exclusively within the skin of the organism, or within a

private and subjective ‘mind,’ in view of the obvious fact that everything

that distinguishes man from the other animals is a common and social

possession. ”3

I t is this image of the self as radiating “outward” and overlapping and

being overlapped by numerous other fields that must constantly be kept in

mind as we focus our attention on particular aspects. Initially and tenta-

tively, therefore, let

us

understand “the self’4 as the widest and most in-

clusive field in relation to the plurality of subfields mentioned earlier, O f

course, it is wide and inclusive only in relation

to

these subfields, because in

relation to suprafields it is itself a subfield. Whether this “field-self’ is a

postulate and what grounds there are, if any, for such a postulate are ques-

tions that can be addressed only after we have attempted to describe the

distinguishing characteristics of this self.

THE FIELD -S ELF A S N O N D U A LI S T I C

As the history of philosophy repeatedly attests, any shift in perspective or

any new idea emerges and can be understood only in reference to the per-

spective or idea it is endeavoring to replace. The Introduction notes that a



48 Persorlnl Znrrnortnlity:ossibility n t t d

Credibility

processview

of

reality ejects an y metaphysical or ontologicaldualism

whereby reality sbifurcated into he chan ging and he unch anging , he

temp oral and the eternal. Similarly, a field view of the self rcsists such du-

alisms as mind-body, psychical-physical, spiritual-material, subjective-ob-

jective, insofar as these terms refer to essentially different o rde rs of reality.5

This is not

to

sug ges t that these distinctions have no meaning

o r

utility, or

that therc is n o difference betwcen, for exam ple, thinking and walkin g, or

willing and running . T h e question is how to acco unt for such differences,

and

a

nondualisticviewdenies hat heymustbeaccounted orby di-

chotomizing the

self

and the world in such a m anne r as to locate one set of

activities in a realm desig nated spiritua l and the othe r set in

a

realm desig-

nated m aterial.

More

positively, the

field

view suggestcd here will attempt

to account for these real differences and distinctions in terms of funct ions

and processes, so that w hile rejecting various m od es of ontological dualism,

it will not hesitate to afirrn

a

variety offunctional dualisms.

Of mo re imm ediate conc crn s w heth er, given the stated aim of this essay,

it will be possible to avoid attr ibu tin g features to the self that render this

model

vulnerabk to s om e

of

the objections raised against Since

I

intend t o describe or const ruct

a

model that does n o t cxclude the possibility

of the se i fs continuing and participating in

a

life beyon d the parameters

of

what we customarily call “this wo rld,” some will see such effort as a “bad

fai th” at tempt to escape co ntem porary argum ents again st dualism . He nce,

let

me

say imm ediately that if an y view

of

the

self

that allows it a reality and

life not con fin ed to th e explicitly localizable and identifiable param eters of

“this w orld” is called “dua lism,” the n of course m y view m ust be so desig-

nated.

While I believe such

a

definitionunjustifably e strictive,what

is

impor tan t

in

the final analysis is not the partic ular label bu t w he the r per-

suasive eviden ce and argum ents,

as

well as plausible speculations, can

be

marshaled

in

s uppor t o f

a

field-self.

PRAGMATIC OBJECTIONS TO D U A L I S M

Whatever the differences between Gr eek , medieval, and m odern expression s

of dualism, they all affirm the reality of an irnmatcrial substance o r substan-

tial principle. W heth er des igna ted m ind, intellect,

or

sou l , this principle

or

entity is made

of

a

kind

of

being and belongs

to

an ordcr

of

rcaiity essen-

tially different from the body

to

which it is joined-mysteriously o r natu-

rally. T h e

nonexistence

of such a principlc

cannot,

of course, be proved, and

pragmatismmakes no such claim. “Our reasonings,’’ am esconceded,

“have no t established the nonexistencc

of

the Soul; theyhave only proved its

superfluity for scientific purposes” (PP, I:332).

We

miss the thrust and ite

of

James’s criticism if wc understand“scientific” in a narrow positivistic sense,

which

would

leave open the possibility

of

accounting

for the

soul by

a

“philosophical” method. It is the uselcssness of the “soul” for

the

purposes

of the broade st intellectual inquiry that leads the pragm atist to exc lude it



Toward a Fieldodel ofthe Se l f 49

from

any explanatory effort. James expresses this view: “ M y final conclu-

sion, then, about the substantial Soul s that i t explains nothing and guaran-

tees nothing” (PP, 1:331). M an y years later, with his customary ph ilosophic

generosity, James conceded that “s om e day, indee d, souls may get their in-

nings again in philosop hy,” but this will happ en “only when someone has

found in the term

a

pragmatic significance that has hitherto eluded observa-

tion”

( P U ,

95-96). James is, pcrhaps,beingunduly gracioushcre,since

“souls” with “pragm atic significance” wo uld not

be

the same “ S O U ~ S ”as

those being rejected.

N o w a defender of a soul theory would undoubtedly reply that the soul is

posited precisely b e m r e of its explan atory powe r and pragma tic signifi-

cance.

The

soul serves

as

a

rational explanation

of

w hy an o r gan i c

eing

has

unity, identity,continuity,and ndividuality.

T h e

pragmatist, as w e shall

see, must indeed account for these characteristics of the self and give so m e

indication of how th is mig ht be don e witlzoul po siting a substantial soul.

Even

apart

from

these features, however,

it

might

be

argued that great prag-

matic significance attaches to an imm aterial substance

or

soul insofar as its

simplicityand ncorruptibilityguarantees tsnatural mmortality.James

does not deny that such

a

soul would

be

immortal ; his claim

is

that the

immortal i ty would be such hat most people would not desire i t .

The Soul, however, when

closely

scrutinized, guarantees no immortality of a

sort U M cnrefor. The enjoyment of the atom-like simplicity of their substance rr

saecula saecrrlorum would not to most people

seem

a consummation devoutly to

be wished. T h e substance must giverise to a stream of

consciousness

continu-

ous with the present stream, in

order

to arouse o u r

hope,

but of this the mere

persistence of the substance per

se

offers

no

guarantee. (PP, I:330)

I will explore this text

more

fully in presenting a substantive self as

a more

fruitful mo del than substantial soul. For th e m om en t, et i t serve to indicate

why, from a pragmatic perspective, the substantial soul is considered devo id

of

significant experiential fruits.

T h e oldest , mo st persis tent , and strongest argum ent

or

the exis tence o fa n

immaterialubstance stems from thatntellectualctivitywhich dis-

t inguishes human beings from other consciousbeings. The arg um en t takes

a

variety of forms,but as Randall describes it, the co nte nti on is basically that

since humans are able to grasp universals wh ich

are

simple and immaterial,

they

“m us t ‘have’ o r ‘possess’ a ‘single unextended immaterial spiritual prin-

ciple’ [called ‘M ind’] with which to

do

it ”

( N H E ,

218). Randall presents three

major reasons why th is argument does ‘ h o t s ee m to present-daymeta-

physicians very fruitful.”

T h e

first

reason is that to posit a distinct princip le for every distinct ac-

tivity would destroy the possibility f explanation and intelligibility: “Every

distinguishable process of Na ture wo uld then have

to

be accom plished by

a

principle uniqu e and proper to itself.” Such

an

indefinite multiplication of



50 Persmal Immortality: Possibility atld

Credibility

principles would lead to intellectual chaos, rendering it impossible

to

“ex-

plain” an y ph eno m en on . Randall asks

us

to

imagine what physics would

look like “h ad Na ture been really so con stituted that each of her distinguish-

abk product ions required

a

specifically diKcrent mechanism

as

its necessary

condition ” ( N H E , 218-19).

Randall’s second reason for rejecting the characterization of “Mind”

as

an

immaterialsubstance is that to do so is “to convert heoperat ion of

a

‘power’ in to i t s o wn mech anism and condi t ions .” T he argum ent h eres that

merely to posit “m ind ” as the “pow er” to act “is to remain wi th a mere

statement of the observed facts, w i thout a t tem pt ing any fur theranalysis of

the complex mechanisms involved.” In oth er words, to at tem pt to explain

thinking by saying wehave the “power” to think s to say an d explain noth -

ing. Randall considers such

a

view analogous to the famous satirical exam -

ple

of

Moliire “of t ry ing

o

‘explain’ the observ edaction

of

o p i u m u p o n t h e

hum an organism as due to i ts ‘do rm itive powers’ ”

( N H E ,

219).

Randall’s final objection

is

that cons t ruing “M ind” as a unique kind of

substanc e makes the factors involv ed in thinking “wh olly private and inac-

cessible” and thereby “obsc ures all the cultural and environ me ntal factors

wh ich are in reality necessary con ditions of any ‘functioning m ental ly’ ”

(NHE,219-20).

In

sum, then, the objections raised

by

Randall, which accu-

rately reflect the views of both Jam es an d Dewey, no t o nly call attention

to

the emptinessof the substantial soul principle but , more important , empha-

size

that the po si t ing

of

such a principle tends

to

diver t energy f rom m ore

concrete and fruitful avenues of investigation.

Dew ey was particularly sensitive

to

w ha t m igh t be called the existential

consequences

of

any ontological dual ism. H e notes ho w s u c h a perspective

leads

to

the extremes of both o bject ivism and subject ivism, which, though

o pp osed , g iv e im petu s ~ dustification one to the o ther . Theocation

of

the

“objective” an d the “subjective” in essentially different .and discontinuou s

orders of reality results in reciprocal excesses. “A n ob jectivism which ig-

nores initiating and re-organ izing desire and imagina tion will in the end

only strengthen that

other

phase o f subjectivism which.

consists

in escape to

the enjoyment of inward landscape.” This ontological split inevitably eads

to a split nphilosophywhereby

we

have

a

“realistic”philosophy “for

mathematics, physical science an d the established social ord er; an oth er, an d

op po sed ph iloso ph y for the affairs o f personal life” (EN,

241).

Dewey goes

o n

to say:

The objection

to

dualism

is

not just that i t is

a

dualism, but that it

forces upon

us

antithetical, non-convertiblc principles of formulation

and

interpretation. I f

there

is a

complete split in nature

and

experience then

of course no ingenuity

can

explain it

away;

it must be accepted. But in case no such sharp division

actually exists, the evils of supposing there is one

are

not confined

to

philo-

sophical theory. Consequences within philosophy

are

of

no

great

import.

But

philosophical dualism is

but

a formulated recognition of an impasse in life;

an



Toward n Field Model of the

Self

51

impotence in interaction, inability to

make

effective

transition,

l imitation of

power to regulate

and

thereby to understand.

(EN,

241-42)

T h e years since D ewcy w ro te these wo rds have hardly served to diminish

the potentially disastrous consequencesof dividing reality an d hum an xpc-

rience into woworldshavingsu ch basically differentconstitutionsand

touch ing and com mu nicating with each othe r on ly indirectly, accidentally,

and incidentally.

As

the allegedly “imp ersonal” and “objec tive” orders of

science, technology, and society have grown

to

overwhelming propor t ions ,

there has emerged in response the passionate call for the recogn ition and

practice o f activities hat flow from anddependalmost o tal lyupon al-

legedly ‘‘inner experience” or “person al faith”

or

“hum anis t ic ins ight” or

“religious revclation.” A t no time in history, perhaps,

as

ther e been a grcat-

er need to overcome the isolating oppo sition of these distinct “aspects” o f

reality and experience, an d to create fruitful m eans and chann els o f transac-

tionand com mu nication. This , needless to say, is

a

formidable ask hat

dem ands the fullest participation

of

a diversity

of

hum an beings bringing

their distinctive exp eriences to bear up on this ques tion . Th ere will be

no

shortcuts and many deadends, as there are in an y kind of experimental ac-

tivity.

A s

a min im um , however, an ef fort must b e m ade

to

rid ourselves o f

that deep ly ngraine d prejudice hat has converteddistinctfunctionsand

processes, which flow intoand

,overlap

one another , n to d i scont inuous

realms o f reality and experience.

FIELD-SELF

AND MATERIALISM

There have been threc me taphy sical accou nts, thoug h with ma ny ariations,

of reality and human beings. In addition to the dualism just iscussed, there

have been

two

forms

of

m on ism . Idealistic

monism

m aintain s that all reality

is ultimately reducible to m ind or is a m o d e

or

manifestation of m ind o r

idea. Materialism,

as

the po lar , oppo s i te of idealism, has insisted that all

reality is reducible to matter-including m ind, w hich is no th in g bu t

a

m o d e

or manifestation of matter.’ W here are we to locate field metaphysics? M y

suggestion is that while partaking of aspects o f all three of these traditional

views, field metaphysics

is

not reducible to

o r

completely identifiable w ith

any of them. Abstractlyconsidered,

a

field model is indifferent to these

three

views

and hence could qu itc easily

be

employed

by

any o r

a l l

of them.

Only after I have spelled

out

in m ore conc rete detail a field mo del that I

ju dg c adequate will we be able to see wh at is shared and not shared with

these other views. Yet inasmuch

as

bothJames and Dewey can

be

and have

been read, a t least in pa rt, as materialists,

a

few preliminary w ords

are

in

order.

T h e various expressions

of

contemporary m aterial isms a re

a

long way

fro m th e relatively clcar-cut ma terialism of Democri tus , in which atoms of

varying sizes and shapes alone we re con side red real and the apparen t dif-



ferences we experience due solely to the arrangement of these atoms.

When

the anthropology

of

Cla ud e Levi-Strauss and the histo ry f Fernand Braudel

are described as ma terialisms, it is eviden t that som ething mu ch mo re su btle

is

a t

workVg

ortunately, it

is

not the task

of

this essay

to

delineate

thc

dis-

tinguishing features of these intellectual expressions.

I

need on ly indicate a

few b road and relatively unrefined meanings of materialism to differentiate

it from the field metaphysics that is here proposed.

Reductive materialism is the oldest and most uneq uivoca l expre ssion of

materialism.Simplystated, tclaims hateverything real is reducible

to

whatever happens to be unders tood as “mat ter .”

Thus,

how ever different

things may appear, ultimate analysis reveals them to be flotlzincg but the basic

constituents

of matter variously organized. This reductionist perspective is

succinctly and explicitly expressed by a character in one of Stanislaw Lem’s

science fiction short stories.

Are not we as well, if you exa m ine us physically, m echanistically, statistically,

andmeticulously, nothingbut heminisculecaperingofelectronclouds?

Positive and negative charges arranged in space? And is o u r existence not th e

result of subatomic collisions and the interplay of particles, thou gh we our-

selves

perceive hosemolecularcartwheels as fear, longing , or meditation?

And w hen you daydream , what t ranspires within your brain but the binary

algebra of connecting and disconnecting c ircui ts ,

he

continual meandering

of

electrons?’o

Such a reductive ma terialism is subject to rather wide spread criticism,11

and am on g its critics we

can

safely

place

pragmat ism with

its field meta -

physics.

We

have already asserted that all fields o r relational processes are

real and that the

task

of in qu iry is to discover the distinctive featuresof these

fields and their relations and transactions withou t assigning metaph ysical

priority or exclusivity to any of thcm. M aterial ism, as Randall indicates,

illustrates

w h e r e

one gets when one does n o t take activities and processes as

primary and irreducible subject-matter.

A

soun d m etaphy sics wo uld say, ac-

tivities, operations, and processes “exist,” and areffected by m eans of mecha-

nisms distinguished as factors involved in those processes. “Materialism” lo-

cates the mcans and mech anisms involved; then by reductive analysis, holds

that o d y these mech anisms can be said

to

“exist”-what hey do does not

“exist ,” but

is

merely something else.

(NHE,

306)lZ

James raises whatmightbe called an existential or moralobjection to

materialism:

A phi losophy whose principle is

s o

i ncommensura te w i th ou r m os t in t ima te

powers

as

to

d e n y t hem all relevancy in universal again, as to annihilate their

motives at one blow, will be even more unpopu lar than pessimism . Better ace

the

enem y than the eternal Void T h i s is w h y m a t e r i a h m wil1 aIways fail of

universal adoption, however

well

it may fuse things into

a n

atomistic unity,

howev er clearly it may prophesy the future eternity.

For

materialism denies



reality to the

objccts

of

almost

all the impulses which we

most cherish.

T h e

real

n z ~ n ~ i r l l gf thc impulses, i t says,

is

something which has no emot iona l

interest

for CIS whatevcr. WB,0-71)

Now

while it is clear that pragma tism’s field metaph ysics escapes th e net

of rcductive ma terialism, it is n ot

so

evident that i t escapes w hat migh t be

called “effective materialism.” By this I mean any view which, while dcny-

ing that the self and its activities are idcntical w ith o r rcducible to the phys-

icochcmical fields to w hi ch they are intimately relatcd,

also

denies that the

self and its activities can have any existential reality apart fr o m these spel- c

physicochemical fields.

Such

a

view, of coursc, u ndcrm ines thc chief concern

of

this essay.

b 3

It is

incumbent upon me to con s t ruct

a

field model of the self that does not e s -

dude

the possibil ity of the selfs co ntin uin go exist independently of 5ome of

the fields w ith wh ich it is presently involved. Notc that there w ill

be

n o

claim ofproving that such an existence

is possible. The task is to show that

this is an open possibility, there by allow ing for

a

reasonable “faith,” w hic h

will have to be suppor ted by grounds other than thosehat

emerge

f rom the

analysis and construction of a field-self. I will co ntinu e to dra w principally

upon Jam es and Dew ey in the construction

of

a model of the field-self.

Rem ember, the intention is no t to sho w that ei ther of these th ink ers has a

fully developed view of the self bu t rat he r to utilize often inconsistent as-

pects of the ir thou ght. This means that I may apply their insights and ideas

in ways that ar e no t explicit in their texts and that

may

even in some in-

stances bc in opposi t ion to some of their conclusions.

Ov erall, this will be so in the case of Dewey more than of James . The

question of effective materialism is a good exam ple. James, though often

inconsistcn t in details, is surely

open

to

the kind

of

field-self here suggested,

particularly when his thought is considered

in

all its aspects, including th e

ethical and the religious. Dewey,

o n

the o ther hand ,will have to be classified

as an effective materialist, since he holds “thatall the subject-matter

of

expe-

rience is dep en de nt up on physical conditions.”14 Nevertheless, th e issue is

not as clear-cut and unequivocal as it first appe ars, and I wish to show that

much in Dewey is congenialo a f ield view o f th e

elf

in spite of

his

unsym-

pathetic attitude toward any speculation abou t imm ortality.

DEWEY’S

RELATIONAL VIEW O F “MIND”

AND

“MATT€R”

Dewey gives two closely connected reasons as to w h y hc d id “no t com eout

franklyand use the wo rd mateviolisrn.” Together , theyare a succinct cx-

pression

of

his

more

developed relational

view of “mind”

and “matter .” His

first reason for rejecting the label

of

materialism is that philosophies s o des-

ignated posit

a

metaphysical view of

substanre

in which mattcr is a substance

and “the only substance.” Since Dewey rejects all modes of metaphysical

substantialism, he

also

rejects materialism as

a

mode

of

substantialism.



Dewey’s second reason is but

an

em pirica l specification

of

the first . Mate-

rialism is an a ntithetical position o pposin g m atter to the psych ical and me n-

tal posited

as spiritual.

Hav ing aban done d this an tithetical perspective,

Dew-

ey ails “ to

see

whatmeaning m atter’and ma terialism ’ have for Phil-

osophy.” He goes on to notehat “matter has

a

definite assignable meaning in

physicalscience.

I t

designatessomethingcapable of beingexpressed n

mathematical symbols which are dis t inguished from those defining nergy.”

T h e general izing of this defini te meaningof “matter” into the philosophical

view of ma terialism is

no

more legit imate than “general izing what is desig-

nated as en erg y in ph ysics into spiritualistic me taphysics.” I f one employs

the term “m atter” philosophically, therefore, “this m ean ing . . . should be

to

nam e

a

jirrrctiorzal

relation rather than

a

substance.”

I t

w o u l d t h e n

be

appropriate

to

use the t e rm “ma t te r”

as

“a name for exis tent ia l conht ions

in thei r funct ion as c o n h t i o n s of all special forms of socio-biotic activities

and

values”

(EKL:

605).

W hatever diffkult ies this doc tr ine mig ht pose

for

the field view of the

self, the following text clearly expresses

Dewey’s

rejection of reductionistic

materialism.

Butrecognition that all theseactivities andvalues are existentiallycondi-

tioned--and

do

not arise out of the blue

or

out of a separate substance called

spirit-is far from constituting materialism in its metaphysical sense.

For i t

is

only by setting out

from the

activities and values in experience justas they ore

experienced that inquiry can find the clues

for

discovery

of

their conditions.

DeniaI

that

the former are just what they are thus destroys

the

possibility of

ascertaining their conditions

so that

“materialism” commits suicide. It

is

quite

possible to recognize that everything experienced,

no

matter how “ideal” and

lofty, has its own determinate conditions without getting into that generaliza-

tion

beyond limits which constitute metaphysical materialism.

( E K V ,

605) i5

O v e r

a

decade earlier, Dew ey

had

presented his ideas o n the mind-m atter

question in his great metaphysical work, Experience avld Nuture,16

T his rich,

subtle, and

complex

text does not admi t of

easy

sum m ariza tion or articula-

t ion; my con cern s to hig hlig ht few passages that pointn the directionof a

field metaphysics and

a

field view of the self. In doing so, of course, I must

touch upon and quickly pass over a number

of

questions and aspects

of

Dewey’s philosophy that meri t much fuller t reatmen t. Am ong these would

be

the nature and rolef “events” in his me taphysics; the question f “mean-

ing” ; the . impo r tance

of

“qu ali ty”; the dis t inct ion between “having” and

“kno win g” and he all ieddo ctrine that th ere is no immediate knowledge; and

the nature and role of “mind,” “m at ter,” “consciousness ,” “spi r i t,” and the

like.

Deweymaintains hat he endency of mod ern cience o ubst i tute

“qualitative events” for “the old er no tion f fixed substances” p oints “to the

idea

of matter and mind as significant characters

of

events presented in dif-

ferent contex ts, rather than und erlying and ultimate substanc es”

(EN,

xi).



T o u d n

Fie ld

Model of the Self 55

At first glance, it m igh t se em that Dew ey is positing “even ts” s the ultimate

constituents o f reality, neither me ntal nor material bu t bec om ing so accord-

ing to the contcxt into which they enter . Such an interpretat ion would be

similar

to

the “neutral m onism” interpretation ofjarnes’s doctr ine

of

“pure

experience” and would be subject to the same criticisms. Again, therefore,

wo uld sugg est undc rstanding “events” as fields-as processive-relational re-

alities. For Dewey , such events can be “h ad ” or imm ediately grasped, bu t

they cannot be “kn ow n.”17

Nevertheless, by seeing nature as

a

complex

of

events,

we

are kept aware

of its processivc-relational character and can avo id identifying it with

or

reducing it to any specific quality. T hu s, Dew ey tells us, “wh en nature

is

viewed as consisting o f events rather than sub stan ces, it is characterized by

his tor ies ,

that s, by co ntinu ity of change proceeding from beginnings to

endings” ( E N , xi-xiii). Further,“events,beingcventsandnotrigidand

lumpy substances, are o ng oin g an d hence as such unfinished, incomplete,

indeterminate” (EN, 159).

8

W hen Dew ey comes to describe m ind and matter , he ssigns bo th to “ the

complex of evcnts that constitute nature” ( E N ,

75).

H e finds “the notion

that the universe is split in to tw o separate an d discon nected rea lms of exis-

tence, o ne psychical and the ot he r physical

.

.

.

the acme

of

incredibility”

( E N ,

267-68).

I f on e begins w ith the assumption that mind and matter are

“tw o separate things,” then one has the task of restoring the c onnection

between them.Both“mechanist icmetaphysics”and“spiritualistic meta-

physics” begin w ith this assu m ptio n, tho ug h they account for the restora-

tion in diam etrically opp osite ways. For the form er, the “cause” hat ac-

cou nts for the other’s existence

is

“mat ter”; for the latter, it is “mind.” In

bo th instances here s

“a

breach n he con tinu ity of historic process,’’

which can be avoided

by

sim ply ob serv ing such processes

as

“gr ow th f r om

infancy to maturity,

or

the development of

a

melodic theme” (EN,

273-74).

It is the notion of grow th, acco rding to Dewey, that enables on e “to detect

the fallacy in b oth views.”

The reality is the growth-process itself; childhood and adulthood are phases

of

a

continuity, in which just because

it

is

a

history, the

latter

cannot exist

unti l

the earlier exists “mechanistic materialism” in germ); and in which

the

later

makes

use

of

the registered

and

cumulative outcome

of

he earlier-or,

more

strictly, i s its utilization “spiritualistic teleology” in germ). The

real

existence

is

the history in its entirety, the history as just what it is. (EN,275)

In stressing the processive character

of

reality, D ewe y is not affirm ing a

doctr ine of chaotic, undifferentiated flux. We can distinguish and differenti-

ate realities and aspects

of

realities

on

the bases of “rates

of

change”

and

breadth

of

connections o r relations. Not all processes change or proceed at

the same rate. “T he rate of change of some thin gs is so slow,

or

is so rhyth-

mic, that these chan ges have

all

the advantages

of

stability in dealing with



more ransi toryand rregularhappenings” (EN, 71). Dcw ey inds t

a

mark

of “sound practical sense” wh en the slow er an d regular events are

designated “structure” and the more rapid and irregular

nes

“process.” But

this is

a

“rela tiona l and fun ction al distinc tion” that both spiritualistic ide-

alism a nd ma terialism treat “as som ething fixed and ab solute. One doctr inc

finds structure in a fram ew ork of ideal forms, the o ther f inds it in matter”

Just as “structurc”an d “ process” are differentiatcd on th e basis o f a “rela-

tionaland unctional distin ction ,” so are“mind”and“matter.” Dewey,

along with

a

number of other contemporary thinkers ,

as

called attention

to

the misleading feature of la ng ua ge wh ere bywe are led to posit substantive

things

or

entities wherever

we

encounter

nouns:

“ I t

is

a

plausible prediction

that if there were an interdictplaced for a generat ion upon the use of mind ,

matter, consciousness as nou ns, and we were obliged to em ploy adjectives

and adverbs, conscious and consciously, mental and men tally, material and

physically, we shouId f ind many of our prob lems mu ch simplif ied” (EN,

Note that Dewey

does

not cla im that our prob lem s wo uld

be

“solved”

by

a mere shift in termino logy bu t that they w ould

be

“m u ch simplified.” We

might

a t

least avo id

a

nu m be r of dead-end “solutions” w hich, while giving

us

a

kind of abstract coherence o r rationality, divert o u r attention and ener-

gies from the m ore con crete exp erien tial aspects of reality. 1 have suggested

that such refocusing is

a

definite fruit of describing reality in

terms of

fields,

of processive-relational com plexes, rather than in te rm s of cssentially differ-

ent “ things” or ord ers ofbeing, and this is the direction of Dewey’s reflec-

t ions on m in d and matter .

Dewey urges us to think “of bo th m ind and m atter as different characters

of

natural events,

in

w hich m atter expresses their sequential ord er, an d m ind

the order of their me aning s in their logical connections and dependencies”

(EN,74).20Ag ain, we mu st avoid thinking

of

“na tural events” as the ulti-

ma te, rreducibleconstituents

of

reality hat com bin e indifferentways

called “mind”and“m atter.” Recall thepointm ad e earlier oncerning

“fields”: namely, that you do n o t have “processes” and “relations” that com-

bine to ma ke a field,

but

rathcr that a l l processes are relational and all rela-

tionsareprocessive. T hi s processive-relational or field view is evident, I

believe, in the follow ing an alogy :

( E N ,

71-72).

75).

Thc “mat te r”

of

materialists

and

the “sp i r i t”of idealists is a creature similar to

the constitution

of

the United States in the minds of unimaginative persons.

Obv ious ly he real constitution is certainbasic v e l n t i o r d z i p s among the ac-

tivities

of

the citizensof the country; i ts a proper ty

or phase of

these

processes,

so connectedwith hem as t o influence their rate and direction of change

[italics

added].

B u t by literalists it is often conceived of as something external

to them; in itself fixed, a r ig id f ramework to

which

a l l changes must accom-

mod ate themselves.

(EN,

73)



Deweyrejects theview“thatma tter, life andmindreprcsentseparate

kinds o f Being,” maintaining instcad that they are man ifestations of “levels

o f increasing complexity and intimacy of interaction among natura1 events”

( E N ,

241).

Here again,

I

thin k Dewey’s doc trine is congenial to and suppo r-

tive of a me taphysics that describes reality as “fields w ithi n fields w ithi n

fields. .

.

.” Th us Dewcy contends:

While thcre is no isolated occurrence

in

nature, yet interaction and connection

arc

not

wholesale and hom ogeneous. nteracting-events have tighter and

looser ties, whichqua l i fy hemwithcerta inbeginningsandendings,and

which

mark

them

off from

other fields of interaction . Suc h relatively

closed

fields come into

conjunction

at

t imes

so

as to interact

with

each other, and a

critical alteration

is

effected.

A

new

larger

field

is

formed, in which

new

ener-

gies are released,

and

to which new qualities appertain.

( E N , 271-72)

Dewey goes on to distinguish “three lateaus

of

such fields,” the physical,

the living, and the mental. T h e physical field is constituted by “narrow er

and mo re externa l interactions,” wh ich are articulated in t h e mathematical-

mechanical system discovered by physics.” T h e second level is that of life,

whichmanifests“qualitativedifferences, ike hose of plantandanimal,

lower and

higher

animal forms.” The dis t inguishing characters of the third

plateau are “association, com m unic ation , par ticipatio n.” Th is me ntal level

“is still furth er ntern ally diversified,consisting o f individualities.

I t

is

ma rked throu gho ut i ts diversit ies , however, by co m m on p ropcrt ies , which

define mind as intellect;possession

of

and response to meanings” ( E N ,

272).21

W hile each of these Icvels “h av ing its o w n characteristic empirical traits

has

its

ow n categories ,” Dewey insists that “they are no t ‘explanatory’ cate-

gories, as explanation is som etim es u nd ersto od ; they do no t designate, that

is, the op eration of forces as ‘causes.’ T he y stick t o em pirical facts notin g

and de no ting characteristic qualities and consequcnces peculiar to various

levels of interaction” (EN,272-73).22

The field character of Dewey’s metaph ysics is also implicit in his notio n

“that

a

highe r organ ism acts w ith reference to

a

spread-out environment as a

single situation.” T h e crucial point being emphasized is that an organism

acts w ith reference to

a

tem po ral spre ad as well as a spatial spread. “Thus an

environ me nt both extensive

and

enduring is immediately implicated in pre-

sent behavior. ope rative ly spe akin g, the rem ote and the ast are ‘in’ bchav-

ior

making it wh at it is. T h e action called ‘organ ic’ is no t ju st hat of internal

structures; it is an integration of organic-environmental connections” (EN,

279).23To express this in field language,

we

mig ht say that an organism is

consti tuted by and through part icipation in

a

diversity of fields varying in

complexity and spatial and temp oral scope, overlapping and shading into

each other. T h e co nt in ui ng intellectual task is the delineation of these fields

in terms

of

their distinctive characteristics, activities, and relations w ithout



58 Pusorla1 Immortality: Possibility arld Credibility

losing sight of the concrete and unique situation that they constitute. This,

o f course, is an open-en ded task that becom es increasingly tentative as we

focus on wider and more complex fields, such as human selves.

We m igh t cite Dewey’s distinction betw een “mind” and “consciousness”

as an example of delineating fields of different spread and scope.

Mind denotes the whole system of meanings as they are embodied

in

the

workings

o f organic ife; consciomness in a being with

language

denotes

awareness or perception of meanings; it is the perception

of

meanings;

it

is the

perception

of

actual events, whether past, contemporary

o r

future, it1 their

meanings, the having of actual ideas. The greater part of mind

is

only implicit

in

any ,conscious act

or

state; the field of mind-of operative meanings-is

enormously

wider

than that

of

consciousness.

Mind

is

contextual and per-

sistent; consciousness is focal and transitive. Mind is, s o

to

speak, structural,

substantial; a constant background and foreground; perceptive consciousness

is process, a series of heres and nows.

(EN,

303)24

Of course, Dewey does not mean by this last sentenc e that min d is

a

static

struc ture related

to a

processive consciousness. Bearing in m ind the “func-

tional an d relational distinction” previously made betwe en “structure” and

“process,” we might say that mind is a field characterized by a slower pro-

cess and

a

wider and more numerous set

f

relations in com paris on w ith the

processes and relations that characterize the field of consciousness.

To illustrate the relation between

mind

and consciousness, Dewey asks us

to ref lect upon what happens

when

we read a book. In o ur reading we are

immediately conscious

of

meanings that come to

be

and pass away; these

existential meanings Dewey calls

ideas.

We are able to have such ideas, ho w-

ever, only “because of an organized system f meanings of wh ichwe are not

a t

any time com pletely aware.” Our ideas o r particular apprehensions, then,

are possessed and determ ined by syste m s

of

mean ing, examples of which

would be “mathem atical mind” or “political mind.” Th ere is , D ewey con-

cludes, a con t inuum or spectrum between these co ntaining system s “and

the meanings which, being focal and urgen t , a re the ideas

of

t he m om en t .”

Dewey faults th e “o rth od o x psych ological tradition” for “its exclusive pre-

occupation with sharp focalization

to

the neglect of the vague shading off

fro m the foci int o a fieldof increasing dimness” (EN,

305).

H e later gives the

following description of the concrete situation:

If we consider the entire field from bright focus through the fore-conscious,

the “fringe,” to what is dim, sub-conscious “feeling,” the focus corresponds

to the point

of

imminent need, of urgency;

the

“fringe” corresponds to things

that have ust been reacted to or that wiIl soon require

to

be h o k e d after, while

the remote ou tlying field corresponds

to what does not have to be modified,

and ‘which maybe

dependably counted

upon

n dealing with imminent need.

( E N , 311125

O n e final text , f rom Huntan

Nature a n d C o r h c t ,

will serve to illustrate

how radical and pervasivewas Dewey’s processive-relational doct rin e of



Towrwd

a Field Model of

the

Self 59

mind. He points o u t that we canno t but

be

perplexed

“by

the problem

of

h o w a c o m m o n mind, common ways of feeling a nd believing and purpos-

ing, comes into existence,” assuming that “we start with the traditional o-

tion

of

mind as som eth ing co m ple te in i tself.” This would mean that

we

have

a

multiplicity of essentially independent minds, and

w e

must then ac-

count for the fact

tha t

they realize the character of “commonness”

or

shared

perspective and fecling.

T h e case

is qui te o therwise f we recognize that

in

any case we must start with

a grouped action, that is, w i t h so m e

fairIy

settled system of interaction

m o n g

individuals.

The

problem

of

or ig in and developrncnt of the various groupings,

or

definite customs, in existence at any particular t ime in any particular

place is

not solved by reference to psychic

causes,

elements, forces.

I t is to

be

solved

by

reference to facts

of

action, demand for food, for houses, for a

mate,

for

someone to

talk to and listen to o n e

talk, for

control

of

others.26

Processes and relations, thcrefore, are no t realities added o n to separate

individualminds, herebybringing hem ogether in a looselyfederated

co m m on m in d. Rather, processes and relations are the constitutive factors

present from

the

beginning of the emergence of an y

mind.

Th us min ds are

for m cd transactionally and always involve concrete en vir on m en tal factors in

their formation. Shared perspectives, customs, feelings, and values

are

to be

expected, then, since the m inds that share them come to be and develop

through

thc

transactional emergence of these perspec tives, custom s, feel-

ings, and values. A m ind isolatcd f rom or comp letely independent of such

features is an empty abstraction. I will later address the questionof whether

a

field

view that excludes the po ssibility of any

isolated

m i n d o r

self

also

excludes the possibility

of

any individual mind or self.



C H A P T E R 3

Jumes:

Toward a Field-Self

An

ulterior unity, but not a factitious one. .

.

.

Nor facititious,

perhaps

indeed

ali the

more real

for being ulterior, for being bo rn

of

a m o m e n t o f

enthusiasm w hen i t is discovered to exist among

f ragments which need only to be jo ined

together;

a

unity that was unaware of itself,

hence

vital and not logical, that did not prohibit

variety, dam pen inven tion.

“ M a r c e l Proust

Rernenrbvnnce

of Thitlgs Past

The

self

in which I believe with a primordial

certainty is no t

a

th inking

thing

enclosed within

itself. I t is op en to a ield

of

independent persons

and things with which

I

am

intimately and really

connected by m y cares and concerns.

”John

Wild

“Will iam James and the

Phenomeno logy of Belief’

O n the surface, James’s doctrine of the self would seem to have developed

through three s tages. Beginning with

a

methodological dualism

in

his

P h -

riples

of Psychology, James

apparent ly moved to a “no-self” doctr ine in the

Essays

on Radical Empiricism, and finally to th e affirmation of a substantive

self in

A

Pluralistic Universe.’ T h is three-stage view is basically so un d an d

helpful as long

as

i t is no t un der stoo d as sug ges ting any clear, linear, and

uneq uivoca l deve lopm ent. In fact, the re are ten sion s, shifts, inconsistencies,

and

even contradictions, notonlybetweenbut alsowithin these

broad

stages. Throughout , James is

much

less clear and confidentabout his

positive affirmations and solutions than

he

is

in describing the problems and

what he wishes to avoid.2

The most ser ious threat to the interpretat ion suggestedn this essay,

as

we

shall later see, is found in those texts in which

James

appears to opt for a

materialistic o r beha vioristic account of the self, o r in which he seems dr aw n

toward a denial of th e reality of the “self” or the “ego .” W hile in other texts

he affirms

opposi t ion

to

such views,3 i t wil l only

e

by

keeping

in

mind

his

overall philosophy, including

his

ethical and religious doctrines, that we can

con fiden tly d eny materialistic o r “n o-self” interpretations

ofjames’s

philos-

60



ophy o f self.“ It is also im po rta nt

to

rem em be r that fidelity to experience in

all its variations and ambiguities was his prima ry concern, rather than any

systematic conceptual consistency. Ra lph Ba rton Perry has well noted that

James

feared “thinness” muc h mo re than “inconsistency.”5

Rather than attem ptin g t o follow the twists and turns, the argurnentativc

subtletiesandobscurities hataccompany the historicaldevelopment

of

James’s doc trin e of self, let us s imply

assume

that he is

from

the first m ov ing

toward a field v iew o f the self. Hcnce, I will select and concentrate

o n

those

texts and aspects

of

this thought which contr ibute to such

a

field view an d

ignore or minimize whatever may point in another direction.

James

a t

t imes speaks primari ly n terms

of

experience that is neither men-

tal nor physical, and

a t

other t imes in terms

of

consciousness. Bo th term s

can easily and properly be encompassed under t h e rubr ic of

“ficld,”

which,

as

we have already

scen,

is one way of und erstandin g “pure experience” and

which, as we shall see , is also on e way t o understand “consciousness.” In

what follows, we m ust ke ep in m ind w hat has previously been said abo ut

fields as processive-relational complexes. M os t i m p or ta nt

is

the point that if

the self is a complex of ficlds-“fields w ith in fields w ith in fields .

.

.”-

then there is no “self in itself.” Th is does not , of course, solve traditional

questions such as “w ho ”

or

“w ha t” is doing the act ing

or

thinking-ques-

lions that

gave r isc to doctr ines

of

the substantial soul or transcendental ego

or

to the denial that there is any “who” or “what .” A field perspective o r

assu mp tion do es, however, shift the focus of

our

attention and present

us

w ith the task, at least initially, o f describing the characteristics of those ac-

tivities co ns titu ting the self,

If we were restricted to citing one text from James that describes m os t

concretely the field character of the self, the fol lowing would d o as well as

any:

M y presentfieId of consciousness is a centre surrounded by afringe hat

shades insensibly into a subconscious more.

I

use three separate terms here

to

describe this fact; bu t I m ig ht as well use threc-hundred, for the fact is all shades

and no boundaries.

Which

part

of

it proper ly is in m y consciousness, which

ou t? If I name wha t s

out,

it already has c o m e i n . T h e c e n t r e

orks

in one way

while the margins work in another, and presently overpower the centre and

are central themselves. W hat we conceptually identify ourselves w ith an d say

we are thinking

of

at any t ime

is

the centre; but

ourfirll

self

is

the whole f ie ld,

wi th ail those indefinitely radiating subconscious possibilities of increase that

we can only feel with out conc eiving , and can hardly begin to analyze.

The

collective and disruptive ways of being coexist here, for each part functions

distinctly, makes connexion with its own peculiar region in the still wider rest

of

experience

and

tends to draw us into that

line,

and yet the whole is some-

how felt as one pulse of o u r ife,-not conceived so, bu t felt so.

( P U ,

130)

T his passage includes explicitly or inlplicitly most of the characteristic fea-

tures

of

the self that

I

will

be

em ph asiz ing. First, however,

I wish

to

focus



62

Personal Immortality: Possibility and Credibility

briefly on the implication of the last phrase of the text-“not conceived so,

but felt so.” That implication is the primacy and pervasiveness of “feeling”

throughout the life and work ofJames. This point was touched upon earlier

when we discussed James’s acceptance, in his last work, of Bergson’s invita-

tion to “dive back into the

flux.”

We noted then that, for James, the “thick-

ness” of reality could not be grasped by means of concepts or conceptualiza-

tion. Stating this point now in more positive language, we might say that

the “thickness” of reality can be “felt” but cannot be known conceptually,

since there is a “gaping contrast between the richness of life and the poverty

of all possible formulas” (TC,11:127).

I earlier called attention to pragmatism’s concern for the concrete; in

James’s stress upon the primordiality of “feelings” in contrast-though not

in opposition-to concepts, we have further evidence of this concern. In

any effort to describe our experience, of course, we are compelled to use

words and concepts, and this gives rise to the danger that James designated

“vicious intellectualism.” The perennial temptation of the rationalistic tem-

per is to confuse “reality” with the concepts that we necessarily employ in

our efforts to render more satisfactory our transactions with and within real-

ity. James’s concern for the concrete and his suspicion of abstract concepts

were present almost from the start of his intellectual journey, but it was only

in his later years and with the aid of Bergson that James felt that he had

broken the “edge” of intellectualism. In A Pluralistic Universe, the last full-

length work published during his lifetime, he unequivocally affirms that

“feeling” exceeds both conceptualization and verbalization. After all the

talking, James tells us, “I must point, point

to

the mere that of life, and you

by an inner sympathy must fill out the what for yourselves”

( P U , 131).

If we

break reality into concepts, we can “never reconstruct it in its wholeness.”

There is “no amount of discreteness” out of which it is possible to “man-

ufacture the concrete.” O n the other hand, “place yourself at a bound, or

d’emblie, as Bergson says, inside of the living, moving, active thickness of

the real, and all the abstractions and distinctions are given into your hand”

( P U , 116).

James’s concern for the concrete and his recognition that “life exceeds

logic” should not be interpreted as

a

mode of irrationalism or antiintellec-

tualism except insofar as rationalism and intellectualism are understood as

confusing concepts or ideas with the full richness of experience and reality.

Similarly, his insistence on the centrality of “feelings” should not be under-

stood

as

a mode of “emotionalism” or “pseudo-mysticism.” This is not to

say, of course, that James denies the reality and importance of our emotive

or affective life, as well as authentic mystical experiences. What is impor-

tant, however, is that his insistence on taking mysticism seriously stems

from his profound desire to explore concrete experience in all its richness,

depth, variety, and vagueness. In Some Problems o Philosophy, published

posthumously, James maintains that “the deeper features of reality are found

only in perceptual experience. Here alone do we acquaint ourselves with



lames: Toward a Field-Self

63

continuity, or the immersion of one thing in another, here alone with self,

with substance, with qualities, with activity in its various modes, with time,

with cause, with change, with novelty; with tendency, with freedom” ( S P P ,

For our purposes “feeling” and “perceptual experience” can be considered

the same,6 and this text and its implications will be repeatedly reflected

when we come to discuss more specifically the various aspects of James’s

“self.” The point here is that “feelings” is the term James employs to keep

us

focused on and open to original experience. Perry has emphasized this and a t

the same time cautioned against a narrow reading or misreading ofJames’s

use of “feelings.”

54).

It

may,

I

think, be said that James’ works contain the most thoroughgoing

attempt which has ever been made to carry all the terms of discourse back to

the original data of sense, or to other immediately discriminated

qcralia.

Like

Whitehead, he suggested that “feelings” was the best term to employ for these

originals. “Sensation” is too narrowly associated with apprehension through

recognized end-organs. “Thought,” “ideas,” and “representations,” all of

which have been used for this or a similar purpose, are too closely associated

with the processes of the intellect. If the term “feelings” is used, this term

must also be freed from its own characteristic limitations, its exclusive associa-

tion, namely, with affective or emotional states. The term must be used in a

sense that makes it natural to speak of a “feeling of relation,” or a “feeling of

identity,” or a “feeling of drink-after-thirst,” or a “feeling of pastness and

futurity.

”7

Are “feelings,” then, physical or psychical? As with “experiences,” we

must say, at least initially and descriptively, that they are neither and both,

the purpose of this paradoxical response being to prod us to look “beyond”

the traditional categories

of

“physical” and “psychical.” Thus, by em-

ploying the term “feelings,” James alerts

us

to the irreducibility of our con-

crete experiences. “It is hard to imagine,” he tells

us,

“that ‘really’ our own

subjective experiences are only molecular arrangements, even though the

molecules be conceived as beings of a psychic kind.” How much more diffi-

cult it would be to imagine, James implies, if molecules were conceived as

beings of a material kind. He continues by noting:

A

material fact may indeed be different from what we feel it to be, but what

sense is there in saying that a feeling, which has no other nature than to be felt,

is not

as

it is felt? Psychologically considered, our experiences resist conceptual

reduction, and our fields of consciousness, taken simply

as

such, remain just

what they appear, even tho facts of a molecular order should prove to be the

signals of appearance.

(SPP, 78)s

The distinctiveness and irreducibility of “feelings” are further rnafiifested

in the fact that we can feel more than we can name. Thus James contends

that “namelessness is compatible with existence.”



64 Persord Itnmorrality: Possibility u t d Credihil i fy

Th er e are innumerable cunsciousnesses f empt iness, no on eof which taken in

itself has a nam e, bu t all different from each other. T h e ordinary way is to

assume that they are all emptinesses o f consciousness, and so that same state.

But the feel ing

f

an absence

s

toto

coelo

other than the absence

f a

feeling; it

s

an intense feeling. (PP, 1:243-44)9

This last sentence succinctly and vividly illustrates that some phenomena

are available on ly thro ug h im m ed iate xperience.

No

kind of “a r gum en t” or

“external” eviden ce could possibly com pel one to affirm what is here dc-

scribed. I will later sug ges t that there is a “depth” or character to the sclf

wh ich a field view illuminates even if it d oes not “explain” i t . Som ething o f

this “ de pt h” is indicate d, th oug h in dualistic language, in James’s claim that

“tendencies” arc grasped fro m “w ith in ” as well as

from

“wi thout” :

N o w w h a t I contend for, and accurnuiate examples to show,

is

that “tenden-

cies”are not only descript ions from w ithout , but that they are amo ng the

objects

o f the stream, which is thus aware of them from wi th in , and must be

described as in very large

measure

const ituted o fj d ir rg r oftendency, often

so

vague that we are unable to

name

th em at all.

(PP, 1:246)10

I t is

.

. . the re insta tement o f the vague and inarticulate

to

its propcr place in

our

mental Iife which I

am

so

anxious

to

press on the a t tent ion.

( P B C ,

150)

James’s desire to reinstate the “vag ue and inarticulate” is therefore not a

defense of obfuscation or romantic cloudiness. Paradoxically, it is an effort

to describe o ur experience as rigo rou sly as possible and to avoid any pro-

crustean cuttingof experience so as to fit

it

neatly into wh at can be nam ed o r

conceptualized. Thus, in our at tempt to construct a f ield m od el of th e self

we will draw ge ner ou sly fromJarnes’s descriptions an d

his

approach, which

takes seriously o ur

own

experience. Robert Ehman has noted that James “is

suspending consideration

of

thos e dim ensio ns o f th e self that are accessible

through inference or through the observat ion f

a

third-person witness.

He

appeals to ou r own first-person exp erience and de scribes the self as it ap-

pears prior to theoretical elaboration.”lI This in n o way denies th e legit-

imacy and even necessity of extrapolating from o r speculating upon o u r

personal experiences. It do es , however, caution against explaining away that

which is present in our immediate experience. We must

begin

from this

experience; indeed, we

must

re turn

to

it-though if

our

speculative and

imaginative forays are successful, the experience

to

which we return wil l be

immeasurably richer and more complex than that from which we began.”

THE “SELF” O F THE P R I N C I P L E S

The chapter entitled “ T h e Consciousness o f thc Self,” on e of the longest

chapters

in

T h e Principler ofPsychofogy

(P P ) , is

filled with

a

richness of de-

tailed description and observation which to this day remains w o rth y of re-

flective con side ration , qu ite a pa rt from its technical and theoretical aspects.

James presents

us

with

a

view

of

the self that has been read by so m e

as



jarrles: Toward n

Field-Self‘

65

anticipating behaviorism and by oth ers as pr o to -phcnon~ eno logy . W i thou t

doing violence to thc text and in keep ing with the funda me ntal thrust of

jarnes’s tho ug ht,

I

believe it can also be read as moving toward a doctr ine

of

the

self

as

a

complex

of

fields.

T h e

yrocessive-relational characteristics

of

all

fields is

m uch in evidence in every im po rta nt feature o fJamcs’s “self.” W hat-

ever obscurities, inconsistcncies, and gaps attach to this do ctr ine , it is qui te

clear

that

it excludes any view

of

thc self as

a

finishcd, permanent, essentially

enclosed enti ty or thing. At the outset , Jam es notes “that we are dealing

with a fluctuating rnatcrial” (PP,

I:279).

3 Th is is not surpris ing, given a11 we

have previously said ab o ut James’s process metap hysics.

I t

is not accidental

that the chapter on the self immediately follows the most famous chapter n

the

Princ-ipler,

the on e in w hich “strcarn”

is

in t roduced

as

thc prima ry meta-

phor for “ though t” o r

As already noted , hrou gho ut he Pvinciyks James ssumes a meth-

odological dualism, which hewill deny in his later metaphysics, but there is

widespread agreement among the commentators that the more imaginat ive

and insightful aspects

of

the book resist being incorporated within any on-

tological dualism.

Let

us assum e, therefore, that any dualistic langua ge we

encounter is to be read

only

as expressing a d ve rsi t y

of

functions-a func-

tional

dualism. Hence, the implici t dualism in the phrase “stream

of

con-

sciousness” is easily circu m ven ted, an d is more in keeping withJanles’s

fun-

dam en ta l in ten ti ons, by designa ting it “ s t r eam o f e x p e r i e n ~ e . ” ~ ~imilarly,

when w e

find

James speaking of the “m e” s objective and the I” as subjec-

tive, we will rem em ber that in his m or e dev eloped metaphysics he views

“objective” and “subjective” as functionally rather than onrolog ically dis-

t inct . Thu s, in discussion of the “me” o r the

“ I , ” the “object”

or the “sub-

ject,” it will be understood that we are

not

referring to different o rd er s of

being but rather focusing

on

different aspects o r functions

of

the self,

As

James himself noted: “the words

I

and me signify nothing m ysterious and

unexampled-they are at bo ttom on ly

names

of emphasis” (PP, 1:324n.).

T h e

field o r processive-relational character OfJames’s do ct rin e

of

the self is

present at the outset of the “Se lf” chapter: “h ts upidesr

possible

sense .

.

. a

man’s

Se l f i s the sum total

ofal l

that he

C A N cull hir,

not only his bod y and his

psychic powers, bu t his clothes and his house, his wife and ch ildren, his

ancestors and friends, his repu tation and w ork s, his lands and horses, and

yacht and bank-account” (PP,

I:279).

Recall that

in

Chapter

1,

1

m a d e

the

point that “relations” are no t extrin sic to the “essence”

of

a being, some-

thin g accidentally added on to

its

substance. Rather, they are constitutive o f

i t; they enter into the very fabricf

a

being, making i t what i ts. Let

us

look

a t

the text ju st cited w ithin this perspective. T he re is no “se l f” to which a re

extrinsically added a body, clothes, wife, o r lands; these are relations that

continu e to form and fashion , build and diminish, expand and narrow, en-

rich and impoverish that reality referred to as “the self.”*6

T he legit imacy

of

such

a

field reading

is

borne out by the ways in which



66

Persor~nl

Zmrrlortnlity:

Possibility atld

Crcdibil i ty

James describes “the C on stituen ts of the Self.” Th ese are first divided into

“the em pir ical sel f’ (me) and the “pure Ego” I) , with the former further

divided into the ma terial, social, and spiritual selvcs. 1 will first consider the

empirical self an d its constituents; after an excu rsus on “the bod y”

I

will

return in the next chapter

to

the “pure Ego” in relation

to

lames’s imp orta nt

but con troversial doctr ine that the thinker is the “passing Tho ugh t.”

To begin w ith, we m us t be on gu ard against understanding the terms

“m aterial,” “social,” and “spiritual” in a traditional, com mo nsense, o r du-

alistic ma nner. N o t surprisingly, Jam es tells

us

that “ the body

is

the inner-

most par t o f

the

material Sew’’ What is

a

bit surprising-and may be an effect

pf

James’s Victorian milieu-is that “clo thes com e nex t,” after wh ich he

adds family, hom e, and property

(PP,

I:280).

Now

it is no t fo r

a

m o m e n t

being suggested here, or in the consideration

of the

other selves, that all

con sti tut ing relat ions are on the sam e p lane and enter into the self w ith th e

same degree

of

intimacy. T h e role played b y different relations and their

relative weight in the determinat ion

of

the self can no t be de term ined a pri-

ori; nor are these set once and for all.

The

self

is a

constant ly changing self,

and a relat ion that ma y be an int imate con sti tuent today ma y be peripheral

tomo rrow and none xistent the day after. Wh ether there are any relations

wi thout which

an

individual

self

wo uld cease

to

be is a question that mu st be

conside red later wh en we focus mo re explicitly on the possibility that the

self

is imm ortal . The point to be s tressed here is that the relations being

described are “real” con stitue nts

of

th e self-in

a

sense each

is

the self or

a t

least a part of the self. “O ur im m ed iat e family,” James s tates , “is a par t o f

ourselves. . . . W hen they die, a par t o f our very selves is gone. If they do

anyth ing wrong, i ts our shame.” This s no pious or sent imental or roman-

tic expression onJarnes’s part, for healso insists that

our

clothes, home, and

pro pe rty are “w ith differentdegrees o f int imacy, pa rts of ou r empirical

selves”

(PP,

11280-81).

T ur nin g to the “social self,” w e see that the ways in whic h w e are re-

garded by ou r fe llow hum ans determine us to be the selves we are. Just as

we should properly have spok en of o u r m aterial selves (rather than self), we

shou ld speak

of

our social

sehe5,

since “ a man

has

as rnany

social selves as there

are indiv iduals who recognize him and carry an imag e of him in their min d”

Whatever

one

may think

of

the suggested interpretation

of

the material

and social selves,

the

phenomenadescribedbyJam es are relatively un-

problem ed, and mo st thinkers wo uld agree that hey have

some bearing

upon the self, though the precise nature of this bearing might b e disputed.

The case of the “spiritual self’ is quite different, beginn ing with the very

desig nation “spiritual,” for it is James’s desc ription

of

this self that lends the

suppor t to

a

materialistic or behavioristic reading.

H e begins innocently enough: “B y the.Sp iritua1 Self, so far as it belongs

to the Emp irical Me ,

I

mean a man’s inner

o r

subjective being, his psychic

(PP,

I:281-82).



James:oward a Field-Self

67

faculties

or

dispositions, taken concretely’’ (PP,

I:283).

N o r is it particularly

upsetting, dcspite

a

degree of vagueness, when James goes o n

to

speak of

the feeling that w e havc o f “a sor t of innermost centre wi thin theircle, o f a

san ctua ry with in the citadel, constituted by the subjective life as

a

whole”

(PP, I:285). When he asks,

“ W h a t

is this

serfof all the other selves?”

his initial

description seem s appro priate t o a self that is designated“spiritual.”

He

notes that “probably

a l l

men would describe i t” as

the active elem ent in all consciousness. . . . I t is what welcomes or rejects. I t

presides over the perception

of

sensations, and by giving or withholding i ts

assent

i t influences the movements they tend

to

arouse. It is the h o m e of in-

terest. . .

.

It is the source of effort

and

at tent ion, and the place from which

appear

to em anate the fiats

of

the w ill .

(PP,

:285)

T he basic consensus bcgins to dissipate, however, w he n an effort is m ad e

to define more accurately the precise natureof thiscentral self. “S om e

would say that it is a simple active substance, the

soul,

of which they are

conscious; o thers, that it

is

no th ing but

a

fiction, the imag inary being de-

noted by the pronoun I ; and between these extremes of op ini on all sorts of

intermediaries w ould bc f ound”

(PP,

:286). James puts to the side for the

moment the ques tion o f w h a t this “central active self” is, preferring to begin

by at tempt ing to describe as precisely as possible ho w it is felt, for “this

central nucleus of the

Self,

.

.

. this central part of th e Self isfelt.” His gener-

al description o f ho w “th is pa lpita ting inw ard ife” feels is still relatively free

of problems. “ I am aware,”Jame s ells us, “of

a

constant play of

fur-

therances

and

hindrances in

m y

thinking,

of

checks and release, tendencies

wh ich run with desire, and tendencies which run the ot he r w ay ” PP,

1:286-

87). Th e bo m bsh ell s dro pp ed (at least for those who resist a materialistic or

behavioristic inte rpreta tion ofJames) when

he

tells us that forsaking general

descriptions and

corning t o theclosest possible quarters with the facts, it is

d i f i c r r l t f or

nte

to

detect

in the ac tiv ity any purel y spiritlrnl elenletlt

nt all.

Whenever my introspectiw gluttce

succeeds itr

twtzirlg

round quickly enough to catch

o w

of these

matrifestrltions

ofsparr-

tuneity it1 the act, all

i t

can everf eel d is t i rdy is some bodily process , f o r the most part

taking pluce within the head.

(PP,

I:287)

Now

what is significant here is that James explicitly includes acts o f at-

tending, assenting, negating, making an effort, rem em bering , and reason-

ing. Th ese acts usually designated mental

or

immaterial o r spiritual are felt

by James “as mo vem ents of som ething in the head” o r nearby.

T h u s

the

rather startling conc lusion is reached that the central nucleus of the “Spir-

itual Self,’’ the

“‘SelfufJelves,’

when

curefilly examined, i s faund t o conrist

main-

l y of the collection

of these

pecul iar mot ions in the head

or

between the head and

throat.”

James quickly adds that he does no t

for

a m o m en t say that this is

all

it consists of,” and a few pages

later

he concedes “that over and above these

there is an ob scu rer feeling

of

som ethin g more.’’

I

will later attempt

to

ex-



ploit this “something more,” which is

a

recurr ing phen om eno n in James’s

thou ght , in favor o f

a

non reductionistic field-self. It m us t bc ackno wledg ed,

how ever, that in this section

of

The

Prirrcipler o Psychology,

James

is

per-

ilously close

to

a

denial o f th e subject o r self and an afiirrnation of

a

reduc-

tionistic behav iorism. l 7 T hi s becomes manifest w hen he speculates on the

consequences of w h a t he concedes

is

a hypothesis: namely, “that our

elltire

fee l ing ofspir i tual act iv i ty ,or what contmody passes b y

thnt

na me , i s real ly

nfeeling

ofbodily

activities whose

exact

nnture is b y most wren overlooked” (PP, I:288). T h e

key consequence of this hypothesis would

be

that “ a l l that is expericnced is,

strictly con sidered, objective”; hence, it wo uld

be

mo re appro priate to de-

scribe the s trea m of tho ug ht as

“a

stre am of Sciousness” rather than ‘‘con-

sciousness,” which

would

be

a

“thinkin g i ts ow n xistence along with what-

ever else it thinks.” I t w ou ld follow, ac cording toJarncs, that “ th e existence

of this thinker would be given to

us

rather as a logical postulate than as that

direct inner perception o f spiritual activity which we naturally believe our-

selves to have.” H e go es

on

to say that such

a

speculation violates

common

sense an d that he will henceforth avoid it (PP, I:291). When we come

to

consider his not ion of the thinker as

the

“passing Thought ,” however , we

will again have to ask w he the r Jamesis do ctri ne can be utilized in the con -

struction of the kind o f substantive self that would allow for

a

belief in

immortality.

Ehman makes a corrective criticism ofJames’s view

of

the self that wo uld

have to be incorporated in the mod el of the self suggested in this essay.

Briefly stated, the criticism is that in his description o f self-feeling an d

self-

love Jam es overlook s the reflexive character o f these experiences and hence

Ioses,

or

appears to

lose,

the “self.” A central feature ofJamcs’s do ctr ine is

that hematerial,social, and spiritual selves are all manufactured o u t of

“objects” that are interesting and aro use the d esire

to

appropriate them “for

their ow n

sakes.”

In bodily self-love, social self-love, and spiritual self-love,

what is loved is always some object-a co m for tab le seat, the image of m e

in

another’s m ind , m y loves and hates. In non e of these instances d o I love a

pure principle o f self

or

a Pur e Ego (PP, 1:303-7).

E h m a n

does not deny the

accuracy o f James’s descrip tion,buthe

does questionw heth er t is ex-

haustive. What James fails to recognize is “the felt reflexivity, the felt refer-

ence back

to

self, that is present in a11 self-feeling and self-love on the adult

hu m an level”

( N E P ,

260).

E h m a n

makes

a

similar point concerning

James’s

claim that the “present pulse of ou r conscious life” can become an objectof

knowledge

only wh en it

has

passed. C on ced ing this, Eh m an nevertheless

insists that our present pulse can “feel prereflectively its own existence in its

very act.”

The present pulse must

feel

itself

as

the central self; it cannot

have

the central

self as

a

mere

object before it. For in this case

i t

could not in a radical sense feel

bodily motions,

sensations,

attitudes, and locations as its own; and in appro-

priating peripheral objects

to

its

bodily

center,

i t

would

not appropriate them

to itself: In order for the present pulse to feel the warmth and intimacy

of

the



69

body

and

bodily

life, it must feel that this is close to itself. Thcre is a m o m e n t

of

self-relation in the

very

experience

of

intimacy: intimacy is intimacy

t o ;

and

for

an

anonymous ,

nonreflective consciousness everything would simply

ap-

pear

a5

prcsent, as objective; nothing

would

appear warm and int imate .

The

body would always in this case appear as an external object, never

a s

its own

body, as the location of its o w n life. ( N E P , 263-64)lR

I believe tha t E hm an is here m or e faithful t o the overall th rust of James’s

thought than

is

James himself when hc suggests that the

elf

may be noth ing

more than a collectivity of “objects” within an imperso nal s tream of con-

sciousness. Recall the earlier stress placed up on James’s no tio n of “feelings”

and his insistence that we can feel mo re than we are able to conceptualize.

He

is con sistent ndcny ing that he

self

can

be

kn ow n directly, ince

through reflective consciousness we are always prescnted with “objects.”To

say, thcrefore, that we can directly kn ow the self or the subject

of

o u r ac-

tivities w ould be to say that the subject can be known as an ob jcct. Th is is

why James

(as

well

as

Hume) can never discover the self thro ug h an intro-

spective o r reflective act. B ut given the weight that James (unlike H u m e )

attaches to “feeling,” it

is

no t inconsistent to acknowledge a prereflective felt

awareness that accompanies all our conscious acts. I y

This crucial notion

of

the sel fs felt awareness

will

be

considcred again

when

the “passing T h o u g h t ” and its relation to unity, continuity, and iden-

tity are analyzcd. Before do ing so however, I m us t briefly discuss a m os t

complex and bedcvi l ing topic: thc “body” and how

t

might be unders tood

within

a

field view of the self.

EXCURSUS:

“THE

B O D Y ”

We have already seen that Jame s has described

the

activities of the “spiritual

self’

in terms

of

bodily feelings.

I

wish to consider those

and

other texts in

wh ichjarnes apparen tly presen ts the “self’ and the “bod y” as interchange-

able . M y purpose is to und erline the am biguity involved in James’s usc of

the term “b od y” and

try

to show how a

field

interpretation of

“body”

is

moreconsistentwith his tho ug ht ha n is

a

materialistic or behavioristic

interpretation.

First, however, I would like to call attention to the fact that any am big uity

attached to the term is by n o m ean s un iqu e toJa m es. n the Wcst this explicit

am biguity goes

back

a t

least as

far

as Paul, wh o ,

in

response to thc quest ion,

“How are

dead

people raised

a nd

what sor t of body do they have when they

com e back?” answered by distinguishing “earthly bodies” from “heavenly

bodies.”ZO Christian thinkers have been deba ting and speculating o n Paul’s

meaning from the earliest t imes, a n d they con t inue to do so. Not surpris-

ingly, there is

a

great range and variety

of

intcrprerations; in spite

of

this

diversity, how ever, it is safe

to

sap that on one point there is a cmsensus-

the “resurrection body” cannot be s imply

and

uncquivocally identical w ith

the bod y as it

is

commonly known and exper ienced.”

Th e absence of univocal m eanin g in “ bo dy ” language is not , of course,



70

Personal Itnmortality: Possibility and Credibility

found only in the West. In Eastern thoug ht there are lengthy reatises on the

“astral,” “sub tle,” and “etheric” bodies, all

of

which are differentiated from

the “ph ysical” body. In addition, there is

a

long tradition within Buddh ism

of the “T r iple Bo dy

of

t he B uddha . ”

Since Pla to, the Western p hilosophical tradition has endeavo red to restrict

the meaning

of

t he t e rm “body” so as to highligh t the non bod ily aspect of

human nature usually designated “soul ,” “spirit ,” “reason,” or “m ind.” In a

sense, this effort culminated in Descartes’s “clear an d distinc t” divis ion of

hu m an beings in to tw o essentially different substances-mind and body-

to

which subsequent mod ern phi losophy has responded n one of three

ways:

acceptance of two ult imate substances (dualism); reduction

of

matter

to mind (idealism); reduction

of

m ind

to

ma tter (materialism). It is only in

the twen tieth century that there have eme rge d various philosophical efforts

to articulate an und ers tand ing of “ the bod y” that doe s notasily fall into any

of

the

three traditional classifications. I believe that pra gm atism

is

one such

effort.

Th e m ov em en t that has brou ght forth the mo st explici t, developed, and

technical expression of the am bigu i ty b elong ing to “ the bod y,” owever , is

phen om enolo gy. An y in-depth conside ration of this issue is beyond both

the l imits o f this essay and the com petcn cy

of

its author. Still, since

I

will

later utilize several ph en om eno log ical com m en tators

o n

Jamcs in sug ge sting

a field interpretation of his use of the term “body ,” i t m ight be helpful

to

show f rom the works of prom inent phcno men onlogis t s tha t James i s no t

alone nreferring to the bod y in amb iguous , vague,and even confusing

ways.

T h e indispensable insight in all

“sou l”

views is that the human person or

self is “mo re” than wh at

is commonly

un de rstoo d as “th e bo dy ”: that is, an

object that can be weigh ed, me asured, located in ma thema tically exact spa-

tial and temp oral coord inatcs, and reduc ed to recise kinds and quantities of

chemicals. T h e task co nfr on ting all nonm aterialistic philosoph ies is

to

ac-

count for th is “more” in a way that do es no t create such

problems

as the

classical Cartesian one o f having to explain how tw o essentially different

substances can interact in such a way as to fo rm on e being. Without claim-

ing to be able to prove that James and the ph eno m en olo gists succeed in this

task,

I

believe it is im po rtant to ke ep n

mind

what they are at temp ting

if

we

are

to

ma ke any sense o f their often

elusive

language. Negatively, they wish

to

overcome the difficulties and lack

of

adequate explanatory power in du-

alism,materialism,and dealism. M or e positively, hey w ish to describe

hu m an beings in

a

mann er dis t inct from but not in opp osi t ion to science,

and faithful to hum an expe rience in its most conc rete and subtle expres-

sions.

T h e explici t dis t inct ion between “thing-body” and “lived bo dy ” proba-

bly originated with

Max

Scheler,” bu t the ph en om en on he describes is a

concern

of

a l l

phenomenologis ts .

A

few

excerpts

from

the thought of jean-



James:

Toward a Field-Self 71

Paul Sartre, Maurice M erleau-Ponty, and Gabriel M arcel will su fic e

to

indi-

cate a similarity of intent and direct ion am ong these thinkers and berwecn

them and Jam es, the ifferences o f overall philosophy and technical language

notw ithstanding . For m y purposes,

a

key similarity is that

all

these thinkers

speak in te rm s of processes and relations-fields-rather than in term s of

underlying substancc and unchanging principles o r essences.

Sartredistinguishesbetweenhebody

as a

“being-for-itself’ nd a

“being-for-others,”

and

h e insists hat “the ycannotbe educed

to

one

another.”

Being-for-itself

must

be wholly body and

i t

must be wholly consciousness; i t

cannot

be urrited

with a body. Sinlilarly being-for-others

is

wholly body; there

are

no

“psychic phenomena” there

to

be

united with the body. There

is

noth-

ing bekitrd the body. But the body is wholly “psychic.”23

Whatever e k e may be said

a b o u t

this far from self-evident text, i t is clear

that Sartre is calling attention to a phen om enon -the body as being-for-

itself-that eludes bo th scientific nd com mo nsenseobservat ions . One

othe r passage can be cited to exem plify the relational character o f the bo dy

as being-for-itself:

“We

kn ow that there is no t a for-itself on the one han d

and

a

wo rld on the other as tw o closed entit ies

for

which we m us t subse-

quently seek some explanationas to how they commun icate . The for-itseIf

is

a relat ion to the w orld ” (BN,306).

The irreducible distinctiveness

of

the l ived bod y

as well

as its p rocessivc-

relational character is a lso a a r m e d by Merleau-Ponty :

The

outline

of

my

body

is

a

frontier which ordinary spatial relations

do not

cross. This is because its parts are interrelated in a peculiar

way:

thcy are not

spread out side by

side,

but enveloped in each other. . .

.

Psychologists oftcn

say

that

the body image

is

dynamic.

Brought down

to

a precise sense, this term

means

that my body appears to me as an attitude directed towards a certain

existing

or possible

task. And indeed its spatiality is not, like that

of

external

objects

or

like

that of

“spatial sensations,”

a spatiality

ofposition, but

a

spntiality

ofsitrration.24

W hether Gab riel M arcel can properly be called a phe nom enolo gist is per-

haps

open

to disp ute , bu t there can be no d ou bt that his reflections o n the

body , halting and unsystem atized as they may be, are strik ing ly relevant to

the concerns

of

this

essay:

O n e aspect

of

Marcel’s view of the bod y is o f

particular imp ortan ce: his strong person alistic em phasis. T h u s he remihds

us that “it

is

not a body, but

my

body, that we arc asking ourselves questions

about .”

He

goes on to say that “speaking of m y b o d y s , in

a

certain sense,

a

way of speaking of myself ’ ; hence, it is proper to say, “I art1 m y body . ” A s

soon as w e d o so, however, w e’e nc ou nte r that am biguity to wh ich we have

previously referred, and M arce l is explicit in d eny ing th at the identification

with

“ m y b o d y ” an

be

proper ly unders tood as a m o d e o f m a t e r i a l i ~ m . ’ ~

I

am

my

body only in

so

far

as

for

m e the body

is

an

essentially mysterious



type of reality, irreducible to those determinate formulae ( n o matter how

interest ingly com plex they m ight be)

to

which i t would be reducible

if

it

could be

considered

merely

as

an objec t” ( M B ,

I:103).

M arcel concedes that

there is

a

strong temp tat ion to reat the bo dy

in

a

detached fashion

as

a

“kind

of ins t rument .

.

. which permits me to act upon, and even intrude my self

into , the wor ld” ( M B ,

I:99).

O n the contrary,

I nm my body in

so far

as

I succeed

in recognizing that this body

of

mine

cutlnof,

in the last analysis, be brought do wn to thcevel of being this object,arl

object,

a

some th ing o r other . I t is at this point that wc have to bri ng in the idea

of the bod y not as an object but as a subject.

( M B ,

i:101)

These views o f Ma rcel, expressed in his

Gifford

Lectures of

1949, were

anticipated many years earlier in his

MetuyhysicallulJmaI.’h

In

a

note wri t ten

in 1923he acknowledged the nonconceptualizablc and nonobjectif iablehar-

acter of “my body.”

Since the fact for m y b o d y of being my body is not som eth ing of which

I c a n

genuinely have an idea, i t is not som ething that I can conceptualize. In the fact

of

m y body there is som ething which transcends whatcan be called materiality,

some th ing wh ich canno t

be

reduced to any of its objective qualities.

.

. . T h e

non-objectivity

of

bod y

becom es clear to o u r min d as soon as

w e

remember

that it is

of

the essence of the objec t as such that i t does not take me into

account. In the measu re in which i t does no t t ake me in to accoun t my body

seems t o

me

no t to be

m y

body. AU,315-1 6)

Two other aspects of “ m y b o d y ” as unders tood by Marcel should be

noted: namely, “my bo dy ” as “fel t,” and as extending beyond the envelope

of the skin. M arcel maintains “that t n y body is mine inasmuch as, however

confusedly, it is felt. .

.

. If I am m y bo dy this is in so

far

as I a m a being that

feels”

( M I ,

243).

A

key

idea in Marcel

s

“feeling

as

a

mode

o f participation.”

While he on ly hin ts at i t , he does suggest that we participate in reality on ly

insofar

as w e are bodies; more, we “feel” rcality on ly in sofa r as we feel

our

bodies.

From th is poin t of iew it seems, therefore, that m y bod y is endowed wi th an

abso lute priority in relation to everything that I can fee1 that is o t h e r t h a n m y

bo dy itself; but then, strictly speak ing, an I really fcel any thing other than my

body itself? Would not the case of m y fee ling someth ing else be merely the

case

of

m y

feeling

myselfas

feeling some thing else,

so

that

I

would

never

be

able to pass beyond various modifications of m y o w n elf-feel ing? ( M B , I:101)

The “felt” character of “ m y bo dy ” is closely bound

up

w ith its relational

character; that

is,

the fact that i t cann ot be localized with in na rrow spatial

and tem poral coordinates .

“I

am inclined

to

think ,” M arce l tells us, “that

there can onlybe a body where there is an act

of

feeling, and

for

there to be

this feeling the distinction between the here and

there

needs to cease to be

rigid” (MJ, 270). I will later argue that the

self’s

relations to a m or e encom -



Jmnes:

Toward a

Field-Self

73

passing reality are the gro un ds

for a

plausible

bclief

in i ts immortal i ty . The

experiential gro un d for su ch an extrapolation, how cver, is the evidcnce that

we are here and now co nst i tuted

by

relations that ex tend the reality of the

self “beyo nd” the confines

of

the “skin.”

Thi s

“tran sce nd ing” relational

fea-

ture

has

already been noted in refcrence to James’s do ctrine

of

“selves.” Th e

following text from M arcel can be cited as reinforcement for such

a

view:

I

am

m y body;

but I am also

my habitual surrounding. This is dcmonstrated

by

the aceration, the division with myself that acconlpanies exile from home

this is

a n

order of cxperience that Proust has expressed incomparably). Am I

my

body

in

a more essential way than I am my habitual surrounding? If this

question is answered in the negative, then death can only be a supreme exile,

not

an

annihilation.

T hi s

way

of

stating the problem

may

at

first

sight

seem

childish.But that,

I

think, is mistaken. We must

take

in their strictest in-

terpretation wordssuch as

belong

t o (a town, a house, etc.):

and

the word

Iacerutiora.

it

is as

though adhesions are broken.

( M J , 259)

M arcel and James,

I

suggest, use

a

sim ilar ph eno m eno n in their “belief,”

“faith,” “extrapolation” con cerning the divine. W hat is significant, how ev-

er, is that the phen om enontself is r ecogn ized by many who would no tlso

share the “faith”

of

a James o r a Marcel. Sartre bears this out : “M y bo d y is

everywhere: the bomb

which

destroys

t n y

house also

damages

m y b o d y i n

so far as the house was already an indicat ion o f m y b o d y ” BN,

325).

JAMES’S “BODY-TEXTS”

Let

us

re turn now to the previously cited body-texts of Ja m cs to see h o w

they may be interpreted so as

to

avoid a materialistic or physicalistic in-

terpretation. Recall that Jame s referred to the “Spiritual Self’ as the “central

active self,” the “central nucleus of the Self,” and

“this

self

of

all the othe r

selves.” T h e startling and confusing feature

of

James’s do ctrine em erge s

wh en, in at temp ting to descr ibe this

self

as concrctely as possible, all he

“can ever feel distinctly is som e bo dily proc ess .” Ev en suc hcts

as

attaining,

negat ing, and

making

an

effort are-so

James claims-“felt

as

movements

of something in the head.”

I t

is not surpr ising, then, that those sympathet ic

to materialism as well as many unsympathetic to it should interpretJames’s

doctr ine of the self materialistically o r behavioristically. “T he re is perhaps

nothing in Jam es,” Ehrna n contend s, “that has been m or e radically misin-

terpreted than

his

account at this point, and he has often been taken as a

mere materialist.” E h m an insists that there is no materialism here, “n o de-

nial of t hough t

or

emot ion, but s imply the observat ionhat w e are unableto

grasp

these

as

purely psychicaI, as nonbodi ly” ( N E P ,

262).

While I obviou sly share Ehman’s rejection o f a materialistic read ing of

these

texts,

the issue is,

I

believe,

a

bit more complicated. The complication

is evident

as soon

as w e ask not whatJames is deny ing but wh at hes affirm-

ing.

It

is always easier t o see wh at

a

creative think er is denying than wh at he



74 Persord Imnrortality: Possibility nnd Credibility

is affirming, and James is no exception. James shared the di%cu lty of our

own contemporary thinkers w h o desire to overcome dualism but are ham-

pered in their efforts by the dualistic language that is so deeply embedded in

the culture and in ou r psyche-body. Still, the dircction is evident, wha tever

difficulties Jam es and wehave in articulating that d ircction. Ehm an h elpfully

proposes hat “whcn James ssscrts hat he ‘acts of attending , assenting,

negating arc felt as m ov em en ts in the head,’ the term

us

o u g h t t o be taken

literally”

( N E P ,

262).27This

a t

least sugge sts that Jame s cann ot

be

under-

stoo d to assert any simp le unequivocal identi ty between the “sclf’ and the

“body.” Indeed,

James seems to acknow ledge

a

distinction when-a few

lines beforedescribing hefeelings of he spiritual self as bo dily move-

ments-he states that “w he n it [th e sp iritu al sclfj is fou nd , it is

f e l t ;

just

as

the body is felt” (PP, 1:286).

In spite of th e fact that materialism ca nn ot be reconciled with James’s

overall ph ilosop hy and that,

as

w e have seen, he explicitly rejects it

as

inade-

quate to fundamen tal hum an needs, textual sup po rt for

a

materialistic in-

terpretation o f his do ctrine

of

the self is no t co nfine d

to

a

few

passages in his

early wor k, The Principles

cfPsychology.

In an equally notorious ext

from

his

essay “Does Co nsciousnc ss Exist?”-som e fourteen years after publication

o f

his

Principles-James added m o re fuel

to

the flames

of

the controve rsy. In

the

penultimate paragraph, and after conceding that “to ma ny i t will sou nd

materialistic,” he states:

I a m

as

confident as I

am

of anything that , in m yself , the stream of thinking

(which I recognize emphatically as d

phcnomenon)

is o n l y a careless name for

what, when scrutinized, reveals itself to consist chiefly of the stream of m y

brea th ing . The “I think” which Kant sa id

must

be able to acco m pany all nly

objects,

is the “I breathe” which actually does accompany them. .

. .

Breath,

which was

ever

the original

of

“spirit ,” breath

moving

outwards,

between the

glottis and the nostrils, is, I am persuaded, the essence ou t of which

p h i l o s e

phers have constructed the entity known to t hem

as

consciousness.

( E R E ,

19)

Harsh words ,

indeed

(“and some would walk wi th him

n o

more”) , but

as

w ith an earlier sayer

of

“h ars h words,’’ it is no t perfectly clear what is being

said. T he m o re tender-minded will take co m fort in James’s acknowledg-

ment that these words will s o m d materialistic,

to

which the more tough-

mindedwillmake he“if

it

looks like

a

duck .

. .”

response. The

phe-

nomenological ly oriented commentators

(who

can

be

classed

as

either tend-

er tough-minded thinkers or tough tender-minded ones) are, I believe, re-

sponsive to the texts u nder consid eration while remaining con sistent with

James’s broad er ph ilosophical conc crns and congenial to a

field

view

of

the

self. To begin with, there is no dispute conc erning James’s effort to find an

alternative to

the

traditional “soul.” Richard Stevens suggests:

Such crudely m aterialistic language seems to have

been chasen

by James as

part

of a stra tegy designed to e l iminate theast vestiges of soul-theory which



75

he

felt led

infallibly

to a

misunderstanding

of

the

body.

I f spiritual activity is

attributed

to

an incorporeal scparate entity, then the body is inevitably looked

upon as

a

mere instrurnent.28

Th e next poin t of agreement

is

that James “refuses to view the body, in

the fashion o f traditional dualism , as an extended mass in space”

V H , 73).2”

Closely allied

to

this is tha t the “bod y”

James

is positively affirming is, in

less technical Ian gua ge, the “lived bo dy ” of the phenom enologis ts . “ I t is

not ,” John Wild maintains, “the body

of

traditional dualistic thought, the

mere mass of ma tter extende d in space. I t is the moving , l iving, consc ious

body which expresses our emotions, and is the non-object ive centre of my

world.”

T h u s ,

according

to

W ild, James came o

see

“th at the elf is ncither

a

physical body, n o r

a

separated con sciousness, nor any com bination

of

the

two. . . . It is a living, sentient body dependent on the th ings among which

it has been thrown,

and

inse para ble from the w orld in which it exists.”3O

Finally, there can

be

l it tle dou bt , as Eh m an has poin ted ou t , that

James

opens

the door to misunderstanding by failing to distinguish clearly

between the body as a mere physical object

as

studied by physiology and the

body

as we feel and live through its movements in our actual conscious experi-

ence.

The

body as

a

physiological entity containing he central nervous system

and brain is

an

object

for

the detached attitude

of

science;

i t

is not our lo-

calized; felt subjective self. ( N E P ,

262)

An imp or tant aspect

of

all of

this is that the ambiguity

of

James’s body

references is not

merely

a terminological ambiguity. Earlier, in discussing his

doct r ine

of

pure ex perience,

I

m ade the po int that thc terminological

ambi-

guity “is groun ded in experiential am biguity”; in su pp ort , I cited several

passages from his essay “T he Place of Affectional Facts,” in wh ich Jam es

maintains that

“our

body

is the palmary instance

of

the ambiguous. Sorne-

times

I

t reat my body purely

as

part

of

outer nature. Sometimes, again, I

think of it as ‘mine.’ I sor t it with the ‘me ,’ and then certain local changes

and determina tions in it

pass

for spiritual happenings ”

( E R E , 76).31 I

sug-

gested that James’s do ctrine w ou ld have benefited fro m the

use of

field lan-

guage, and I would l ike now to expand this point a bit with referencc

to

his

doct r inc

of

the “body.”

Bruce W ilshire points o u t that James “treats the body as a topic know n

always as the sam e w ithin an O bj ec t that has field-like

as

well

as

stream-like

characteristics”

(W’P, 128).32A

brief consideration

of

the man ner in w hich

James understands “topic”

and

“O bje ct” w ill clarify W ilshirc’s statemen t

and

indicate som e gro un ds for the field view being suggested. T he ter m s

“topic,”

“kernel,”

and “fractional o bject” ll mean the same

or

James. They

point

to

or express a “par t” of t he Ob jec t w hic h is really

the

thought’s “en-

tire co nt en t or deliverance,neither more

nor

less.”Jam es llustrates his

point wi th he hou ght , “C olum bus d iscoveredAmerica in 1492.” Mo st

people,

if

asked

what in such

a

case is the object

of

one’s tho ug ht ,

would



76

Persorrnl

Itnmortulity: Pus5ibility a d

Credibility

reply “Columbus” or “America” or “th e discovery

of

America.” According

to James, however, “it is no th ing sh or t

of

the entire sentence, ‘Columbu s-

discovered-America-in-1492.’ ” Further, if we w ish to feel the idiosyncrasy

of

this thoug ht, we mu st reprod uce i t just “as i t was ut tered, with every

wo rd fringed and the wh ole sentenc e athed in that original halo of obscure

relations, w hich, ike an ho rizon, hen

spread

about i ts meaning” (PP,

1:265-64). Now if, as W ilshire sugge sts, “the Ob ject in its prereflective to-

tality” is the “field of consciousness” (W’P, 128), and the body is a “ topic”

within an “Object,” i t seems apt to describe it as a “field within a field.”

Such

a

description receives support, I believe, from James’s claim that ou r

bodies “are percepts in

our

objective field-they are sim ply the m ost in-

teresting percepts there. W hat happens to them excitcs

in

us

emo tions and

tendencies to action mo re e nergetic and habitua l than any wh ich re excited

by other portions,of the ‘field’ ”

(PP,

I:304).

Remember , I

am

not claiming that James is here, or in the othe r texts

cited, consciou sly and deliberately co nstructing a field do ctri ne of the self. I

am and will con tinue sugg esting , however, that these experiential descrip-

tions lend themselves to incorporat ion wi thin such

a

field metap hysics, and

the utili ty o f these texts for fashioning such

a

metaphysics-rather than the

explicit inten tio n ofJames-is

m y

primary concern. Consider ,

for

example,

the way in wh ich he spea ks o f th e multiplicity o f selves that constitute the

empirical self

or

“ m e ” ( w ehave still to conside r that other constituent of the

self-the pure Ego). Surely James does not mean that each o f these is an

ent i ty som eho w s tacked

up

within a container self, No physicalistic irnag-

ery will convey the fact that each of these selves is the self th rou gh an d

thro ug h. Bu t a field m etaph orwouldseememinent lyappropr iatehere,

since fields are overlapping and inclusive, able to co m e and go with both

continu ity and discontinuity.

A s

I

have repeatedly acknowledged, th e uti-

lization of the field m etap ho r does not “exp lain” how such overlap ping si-

multaneity o f multiple yet unified ealities is possible (th ou gh it do es turnus

away from

a

num ber of dead-end pathways while keeping

us

focused up on

the c onc rete ex per ien td f low )”no mo re, for ex am ple, than does speaking

of

thelived”

or

“live body” explain how, according

to

Merleau-Ponty, “its parts are inter-related in

a

peculiar way: they are no t

spread

ou t s ide

by

side,

but

enveIoped in each 0 t h e r . ” 3 ~W hatever they are

t ry ing tosay, it

is

clear that when James and Merleau-Pontyefer to “parts,”

wh ether of the self or of the body, they d o n o t mean “parts” in the same

sense as when speaking

of

parts of an automobile or even parts of o u r ob-

ject-body.

Th ere rem ains on e oth er crucial body-text to consider-a text at once a

suggestion

of

an d an obstacle to the field view of the self. What I

would

like

to do is

to

read this text in er m s

of

the field assumptions previously posi ted,

conceding the somew hat procrustean haracter of such an effort.

The

text in



question is part of a lengthy footnote to “T he Experience

of

Activity,”

orig-

inally delivered in

1904

as th e Presidential Address to thc American Psycho-

l o g i c a l A ~ s o c i a t i o n . ~ ~n this note James is responding

to

a cri tic w h o had

taken

h im

to task ‘ 4 f ~ rdcntifying spiritual activity with ccrtain mu scular

feelings,” basing the cha rge on the text we have already discussed. James’s

first point is that his intention was

to

show that “there is

n o

direct cvidcnce

that we feel the activity

of

an inner spiritual agcnt as such.”

He

goes on

to

disting uish three “ac tivitics.” First is the activity in “the mere

t trnt of

expcrj-

ence, in the fact that som eth ing is go ing

on.”

For my purposes, I will refer

to this as the strcanl

of

cxpcriencc-the gen eral flow ing

ficld

of reality.

W ithin that fieldJa m es furth er disting uish es “tw o wh ats, an activity felt as

‘ou rs,’ and an activity ascribcd

to

objects.”

H c

insists that in the dispu ted

text his concern was to eterminewh ich activity with inhe total

experience-process” ould prope rly e designated “o ur s.”

In

language

whosc

surface sen se is surcly m aterialistic o r bchavioristic, hc states: “So far

as we arc ‘persons,’ and contrasted and opposed o

a n

‘cnvironment , ’ move-

ments in our body f igureas o u r activities, and I am unable to f ind any other

activities that are o u r s in

this

strictly personal sense.”

James conced es that there is “ a

wider sense in w hich the w h o k ‘cho ir o f

heaven and furniture

of

the earth ,’ and their activities,

are

ou rs, for they are

our ‘objects.’ ” In this sensc, however, “‘we’ are

.

.

.

only another n a m e for

the total process

of

experience, another namefor

all

that is.”

This

last has

an

almost monistic ring to it insofar as i t suggc sts that there is one process

constituting all that is. When James’s later doctr ine concerning theelf-corn-

poundingof consciousness is considered,w ewillencounter hisnotion

again and with

a

pan theistic flavor. It will be seen that James is eager t o stress

the “intimate” character of the divine but in

a

way that does not deny the

reality

of

individuals. Hence, there w ill be an o verlapping o f consciousness

(“fields with in fields”) that

al lows

for both individuality and the encompass-

ing character of the divine.

I

am contending that the note under considera-

tion anticipates this laterdoctrine and that in bo th instances James’s in sig ht is

better expressed in field language. To illustrate furthe r, let us re turn to the

text in which James says that it is not “we,’ as the “ total process of experi-

ence” but the individualized self that was thc focus of his concern in the

previously cited texts conc erning the spiritual self and mo vem ents

in

the

head.

He

then

reinforccs

his

early expression:

T he individualized sclf, which I believe to be the only thing properly called

self, is a part of the world experienced. T h e world experienced(otherwise

called the

“field of

consciousness”) corncs

a t

all t imes with

our

body as its

centre, centre of vision, centre o f action, centre of interest. Where the bo dy is

is “here ”; wh en the body acts is “now ”; wh at the bod y touch es is “th is”; all

other things are “there” and “then” and “that .” These word s of emphasized

position imply a systematization of things with reference

to

a

focus

of action



78 Persorial Immortality: Possibility and Credibility

and interest which lies in the body. . . . The body is the storm centre, the

origin of co-ordinates, the constant place of stress in all that experience-train.

Everything circles round it, and is felt from its point of view.

Recalling the previously made distinction between the “thing-body” and

the “lived body,” our initial response to this text is, “To which of these

bodies is James referring?” The question is seriously misleading, of course,

if it implies that there are two bodies; it would then land us back in that

ontological dualism James was continually striving to overcome. On the

other hand, if we take “body” in the scientific or commonsense meaning,

we cannot avoid materialism. If there is implicit in James, as the commen-

tators have maintained,

a

distinction between the body

as a

physiological

entity and as “lived,” then it can only be

a

distinction of focus and function.

The thing- or object-body can only be the lived body viewed more nar-

rowly, viewed as

a

limited field within

a

more inclusive field. James is point-

ing,

I

believe, to that more inclusive body field which, while not separate

from the “thing-body,” is also neither reducible to nor simply identical with

it.

In Stevens’s commentary on the text under consideration, there is, in my

opinion, support for the kind of field reading being presented: “These terms

designate a network of positions, a system of coordinates, whose focal point

is always the body. No experience is possible for us, unless it fit into this

oriented system of references” ( J H ,

74).

While he does not say

so

explicitly

in this passage, Stevens is clearly referring to the lived body, as is evident in

a later passage in which he states that Husserl and James “both agree on the

ambiguous situation of the animate body which reveals itself simultaneously

as a Thing in the world and as the center of coordinates to which the rest of

the world is related”

( J H ,

88).35 tevens describes the body as “the func-

tional center of my consciousness,” and as “the zero-point, the locus of

every field of consciousness” ( J H , 143,

86).36

One other segment of James’s lengthy footnote merits consideration. It

immediately follows the last passage cited:

The word

“I ,”

then, is primarily a noun

of

position, just like “this” and

“here.” Activities attached to “this” position have prerogative emphasis, and,

if activities have feelings, must be felt in a peculiar way. The word “my”

designates the kind of emphasis.

( E R E ,

86n.)

Apart from the relational character of the “I,” this passage can be read as

implying, or at least not foreclosing, the reality of a personal self that is

“more” than an object in what Ehman called “an anonymous stream of

consciousness” ( N E P ,263). Recall that Ehman criticized James for the failure

to acknowledge “the felt reflexivity, the felt reference back to self,” in many

of our experiences. In his desire to stress that when we reflect, we always

encounter the self as an object within the stream of experience, James flirts

with

a

“no-self’ doctrine. The corrective for this tendency, as Ehman in-



Jntiies: Touwd n Field-SeCf

79

sists, is to acknowledge the selfs prereflective awareness of its own exis-

tence. Does the passage just cited recognize this awareness? I t depends,

I

believe, on how we understand the “peculiar way” in which the activities

attached to the

“I”

are felt. Is the “prerogative emphasis” an act of prereflec-

tive self-reference without which the self would be reduced to just another

object in “an anonymous stream of consciousness?” If

so

understood, it

would certainly soften the “materialistic” implications of those passages

previously cited.

Important as they are,

I

do not believe that James’s doctrine of the self can

be constructed from these “body-texts” alone. Nevertheless,

I

have dwelt

upon them

a t

some length in order to show that they need not be read in

a

materialistic or behavioristic sense and that they can properly be read as

pointing toward a field view of the self. Since

I

have chosen to speak in

terms of “self’ rather than “body”-even “lived body”-it is important to

reemphasize why James was attracted to “body” language. The point has

repeatedly been made that James wished to account for the data of experi-

ence without recourse to any nonexperiential spiritual or transcendental

principle or any immaterial soul. But he also had a more positive reason for

describing experience in bodily terms: namely, that such languagc keeps

us

aware of the concreteness, immediacy, otherness, uniqueness, and centered-

ness that characterize the stream of experience while protecting us against a

deenergizing absorption in empty abstractions.37

These are also the features James wishes to emphasize when he makes

sensation, as Perry says, “the prototype of experience.” But Perry notes the

same kind of ambiguity attached to “sensation” that was earlier noted in

reference to “body.” Sensory experience

is

not, for James, what it is for

those empiricists who “reduce the concreteness of experience to sensational

atoms” or “limit the

qualia

of experience to the ‘six senses’

”

(SWJ,

47-48).

Nevertheless, according to Perry, “sensory experience is still typical of exis-

tence in respect of that character of fullness, direct presence, and shock of

externality which distinguishes it from thought, memory and imagination”

SWJ,

70).38Since concreteness and its allied characteristics are the claimed

advantages of the field metaphor, and inasmuch as it has been suggested that

the body can be understood in field terms, why use, as

I

do, “self language”

instead?

To

some extent the difference in speaking of “self field” or “body field” is

only terminological. Nevertheless, I would maintain that in view of the

aims of this essay (and I would say the overall aims ofJames’s philosophy),

“self’ is

a

less misleading term than “body” for referring to the& reality

of

the human being. Notice that I say “less misleading,” for the danger in

speaking of the “self’ is that while it is

a

more palatable term for contempo-

rary thinkers than “soul” or “spirit,” it may simply mask an unacceptable

dualism. Still, I believe the likelihood that “body” terminology will eventu-

ate in materialistic reductionism is greater than that “self’ terminology will



dissipate in to vacuous spirituality. T h e reason for this,

I

would suggcst, is

that we apparently have morc “exact” language for the body both in cience

and in

common sense. 3y The very vagueness of the term “se lf’ s an advan-

tage in that it keeps

us

open

to

dimensions of human reality never adc-

quately grasped when speaking

of the

“body.” This

is

reflected,

I

believe, in

ordinary langua ge that expresses a long-standing belief, insight, intuition,

or perhaps prejudice that we are

“more”

and

“other”

than o ur bodies.4o

But

the

dist inct ion between theself and the body is no t restricted to co m -

m o n

sense

or to the various

forms

of dua l i sm.

George

H er be r t Mead , w ho

is within the pragm atic tradition, shares ma ny assum ptions and principles

withJam es and Dewey, and has given us a very rich philosophy of the self as

social. Nevertheless,

he

explicitly asserts that “w e can distinguish very

dcfi-

nitely between the self and the body,” since “theelf has

a

character w hic h is

different from that of the physiological organism

Finally,

it is

more cons is tent wi th and fai thfulto James’s mo re d eveloped

view of the self, wh ich w ill be prcsented later,

to

speak in terms of the self

rather than the body. Ha ns Linsch oten has pointed ou t that “t oJ am es , the

Self was a proper ty

of

a bod y, al thoug h it can, and sometimeseven must, be

described

as som eth ing different from th e body.”43 Even in that section

of

The

Prirlciples

of

Psychology

in which Jam es describes the spiritual

self

as

“movements

in

the head” or “bod ily feelings,” he still seems to distinguish,

as previously noted, the spiritualself f rom the body:when insisting that the

spiritual self “is felt ,” he imm ediately adds, “just as

the

body is felt” ( P P ,

I:286). If this we re an isolated tcxt,

i t

wo uld prove nothin g, but i t is con-

sistent with the kind of distinct me aning that belongs to what James

will

later call the “ j d l self’ ( P U , 130).43



C H A P T E R

4

James: Personal Identity

Who is

it

that

can

tell

me

who I am?

King

Lenr

“Wil l iam

Shakespeare

For every man alone thinks h e hath got

To

be

a

Phoenix, and that then

can

bee

None

of that

kinde,

of

which

he

is,

but

hee.

”John Donne

“An

Anatonly

of

the World”

To

find wherein personal identity consists, we

must

consider what person

stands for;

which, I

think, is a thinking intelligent being, that has

reason and reflection,

and

can consider itself as

itself,

the

same

thinking

thing, in different times

and places.

-John Locke

Essay

Cortcerning

Human

Understurlding

Having had his say co ncernin g the em pirical self (m e) and its constituent

selves (material,social,spiritual),

James

nextdeclares hat thedecksare

“cleared for the strug gle w ith tha t pure principle of personal identity,” the

pure Ego (I) which has been repeatedly alluded to

b u t

whose description

was postpo ned. After noting that “ever sinceHume’s time, it

has

been

justly

regarded as the mo st puzzling puzzle w ith which psy cholo gy has

to

deal,”

Jamesconcedes hatwhateversolutionhe adopts “will fail to satisfy the

majority of those to whom it is addressed” (PP, 1:314).l

Ther e is hardly

a

m or e crucial issue

for

the purposesof this essay than that

of

personal dentity. U nle ss

a

“reasonable”

case

can

be made

for

a con-

tinually changing self thatnevertheless embodies

a

significant mode

of

“sameness” o r “identi ty,” any belief in imm ortal i ty or resurrect ion wo uld

be characterized by e m ptin ess a nd blindness. Before explicitly considering

“personal identity,” however,

and

the solution thatjarnes adop ts in

T h e

Prin-

ciples ofPsychology,

I

would l ike

to

recall and reemp hasize so m e crucial prin-

ciples and presupp ositions of his more general philosophy.

Again and

again

th roughout the Principles, James insists

that

he is con-

cerned only with th e psy cholog ical, not the me taphysical, d imen sions

f

the

81



82 Persotrnl

Imrrortrllity:ossibility

nttd

Credibility

various problems undc r conside ration. Ag ain and again, however, he mcr-

ges the tw o, a nd he latcr realized that they ca nn ot bc kcpt com pletely apart

regardless

of

one’s me thodo logical inten tions.‘ W ithout co mp letelyconflat-

ing the psycho logical (descriptive) an d the me taphysical (spec ulative), have

suggested that the deeper thrust and significance ofJames’s position

on

such

specific questions as truth, self, and God can

be

graspcd only by surfacing

themetaphysicalpresupp ositions hatperm eate his m o re particularized

responses.

Recall the carlier con tentio n that the pragm atists in general and James in

part icular arc best un de rstoo d w ithin the

framework

of

a mctaphysics of

process and relations, a m eta ph ys ic of “fields.” Again, I m ake no s ugges t i on

that his is a fully develop ed and systematized metap hysics,

or

that ndi-

vidual pragmatists-cspccially James-have beenperfectlyconsistent n

pursuing the implicat ionsof a radically ch anging an d relational world. Still,

the hypothesis governing this essay is that when pragmatism is understood

as presupposing such

a

world, it offcrs rich resources for the treatment of a

rangc of questions, including those that fall und er the head ing of “philoso-

phy of religion"-and am on g these is the quest ion

of

personal immortal i ty.

I will attem pt, there fore , to illustrate this point m ore co ncretely in the con-

sideration o f James’s do ctri ne

of

personal identity.

James’s insistcncc that

he

is presupposing dualism in is psychology gives

rise to the oft-noted conflicts and inconsistencies that populate h e Pritzciples

OfPsychofogy.

I have suggested tha t for the purpo ses o f this essay, Jame s w ill

be

read in the light

of

his latcr rejection of ontologica l dualism; therefore,

his dualistic langu age, which can not be com pletely avoided, will be under-

stood functionally rather than ontologically.

There

is o ne self with a variety

of functions; hence, I maintain

that

the distinction between James’s “objec-

tivc

me”

and “subjective I” is

a

distinction

of

focus and fun ction .

An

ex-

t remely imp ortant implicat ion of this perspective,

as

we shall see, is that

inasmuch as functions are “real” andare neither epiphenomena1 nor in need

of some underlying substantial principle, then if there are real I-functions,

there is

a

real

I.

An other central presupp osition, already tou che d up on , is that the deepest

features

of

reality-its “thickness”-are grap sed in “fee lings,” som etim es

referred to as imrnediatc or perceptual experiencc. T h e self, insofa r as it is an

identity-in-diversity,

a

sameness-amidst-differences,

a

unity-within-plu-

rality, m ust be “felt.” “Whatever the content of the e g o may be,” James

states,“it is hab itually felt

with

everything else by us humans , and m us t

form a

liaisorl

between all the hings of which

we

becomesuccessively

aware”

(PP,

~ 2 3 5 ) . ~ust how “feeling” is to be und erstood and wh ether it is

adequate t o account for personal identi ty are andre likely to remain matters

of intense dispu te, but-fo llow ing James--I believe it high ly unlik ely that

any claim

to

establish the reality

of

personal identity will

be

able to dispense

com pletely with feeling

o r

s om e th ing ak in t o it a4

An

important aspect

of

James’s un ders tand ing

of

“feeling,” of course, is that it must be seen within



his metaphysics o f cxpericnce and no t as so m e esoteric activity that is im-

ported

f rom a rcalm beyond experience when reason fails u s 5

To say that personal idcn tity is felt is no t to m ak eany exclusive claims for

the expcriencc o f sclf.

“In

James,’, Perry states, “the perso nal sub ject oses

all

of its special privilcges. It m us t su bm it to thc c om m on tcst.

I f

i t is thcr c a t

all it must give evidcnce of its cxistencc, and this evidcncc furnishcs, so far

as

it goes, the only clue to its nature and character.”‘) T hc “g ro u nd ” cvi-

dence, for James, is what is fclt o r what is prescnted

in

percep tual expcri-

ence. While this feeling or perccptual experience never admits o f exhaustive

cxpo sition, it is no t 3 representation

of some

kind of noum enon ly ing be-

hind or beyond the phc nom cno n. A s he wrote to

Hugo

M iinsterberg in

1900,

“ M y fundamental objcction to you r philosop hy is that

1

still believc

thc immcdiatc l iving m om en t

of

cxpericnce to be

as

‘dcscribablc’

as

any

‘scientific, sub stitute here for

can

be” (TC, 11:150).

I t

is thiscrediting

of

cxperience that led James to affirm thc irnportancc o fJ o h n Lockc insofar as

he had “m ade

of

‘personal’ identity (the only practically important sort)

a

directly verifiable e m pirica l ph eno m en on . W he re not actually experienced,

it is M y pointerc is no tomaintain thathisssertion

is

un-

problem ed but simply to stress the centrality of pcrceptual cxperiencc o r

fceling in James’s do ctrinc of perso nal iden tity.

O n e further

point

in this regard is tha t idcn tity or sameness as “ f ~ l t ’ ~ust

be distinguished from the identi ty or sameness that characterizes concepts.

I t was only in Jarnes7s ast philo sop hy that hc thou gh t hc had finally b roken

loose

from

the

“logic of

identity’’ that so ha m pcrc d his efforts

to

describe

the flux of expcriencc: “W ha t, th en , are the peculiar features in the percep-

tual flux wh ich thc conce ptual translation

so

fatally leaves o ut?” Jame s

re-

sponds

that the

cssencc of life is its continuously ch anging character, wh ile

concepts are discontinuous and fixed. “When

we

conceptualize,

wc

cut and

fix, and exclude everything but wh at we h a w fixed

.

.

.

whereas in thc real

concretc sensible flux o f life, experiences cornpe nctrate cach other so that it

is

not

easy

to kn ow just wh at s excluded and what is no t” (PU, 113)? James

brings ou t the importancc

of

thc distinction in his dcscription of the con-

t inuity and sameness that belong

to

personal expcriencc.

What I

do

feel simply when a a ter m om en t of my expcriencc succeeds a n

earlier one is that tho there are two moments, thc transition from

one

to the

other is

mrrtir~~rorrs.

ont inui ty herc i s a defini te sort

of

expe rience; just as

definite as is the di~CL7}1fittUily-PXpErieIIccwhich

I

find i t mpossible to avoid

w h e n

I

seek

to

make the t ransi t ion from an experience of

m y

o w n to

one of

yours.

. .

. Practically t o experiencc one’s personal con t inuum

i n

this

living

way is

to

know the originalsof the ideas

of

continuity and sanlencss,

o

k n o w

what the words stand for concrcte ly,

o

o w n

all

that they can ever m ean . ( E R E ,

25-26)

But

it

is

this experiential

sameness

a n d

co ntin uit y that are, according

to

the rationalists, excluded by logic. “‘Sam eness,” they have said, m ust be a



84 P e r s o d I mm o r t d i t y : Possibility

orld

Credibility

stark numerical identity; i tcan’ t run on f romnext

to

next. Co ntinuity can’t

mean mere absence

of

gap; for if you say two thin gs are n imm ediate con-

tact, at the contact how can they be two?” These thinkers end up “by sub-

st i tut ing

a

lot

of

static objects

of

conception for the direct perceptualxperi-

ences” ( E R E , 2 1 3 ) . ~hey consider i t absurd

to

ma intain that the “self-same”

funct ion s dfferen t ly wi th and wi tho ut som ething lse , “b ut th is i t sensibly

seems

to

do.” James does no t deny t ha t “qua this an exp erience is no t t he

same as it is

qr rn

that .

.

. b u t t h e qlras are conceptual shots

of

ours at its

post-mortem remains.” In its sensational immediacy, however, “everything

is at once wh atever ddfere nt things i t is

a t

o n c e a t d.”t is

only

w h e n

concepts are substituted for sensational life that inteuectua hsm appa rently

tr iumphs through i ts

claims

to p ro v e “t he mmanent-self-contradictoriness

of all this smooth- running f in i t e exper ience” (PU, 120-21).

A

central and disp uted featurc ofJam es’s doctrine

of

the self is that the

“passing T h o u g h t is the thinker.” I will later analyze this and suggest an

interpretation congenial both

to

a

field metaphysics and a belief in personal

immortality. A crucial feature of that analysis will be James’s no tio n o f t he

“specious present”-the claim that in imm ediate expe rience we grasp both

the receding past and th e e me rging future. A gain wish

to

stress that this is

no t

a

conceptual grasp but

a

felt grasp: “ T h e tiniest feeling w e can possibly

have comes with an earlier and a later part and with a sense of their continu-

ous

procession.” James insists that the “passing” m o m e n t is the m inim al fact

and that “if we do not feel bo th past and present in

one

field of feeling, we

feel the m n o t

at all”

( P U , 128).Th is “tem po ral” character o f experience and

reality, explicitly articulated in James’s later philosop hy , is imp licit in and a

key to unders tanding

his

earlier views on the self. At the heart of this tem-

porali ty is “con tinuou s ransi t ion”or“change,”which, as I have been

stressing, can be mm ediatelyexperienced o r felt butcannotbegrasped

through conc epts .

Th i s

is an extremely importan t point as rcgards any at-

tempt to understand the nature of the self; asJames notes, “personal histo-

ries are processes

of

change in t ime, and the c h a r y e itself is one

of

the things

inrrnediately experienced” (ERE, 25).

Th e general point I am at tempt ing

to

make in these introduc tory rema rks

to

a

description ofJames’s do ctr inc f th e elf as presented in The Principles of

Psychology,

is that this do ctrine is mu ch enriched wh en read w ithin the incip-

ient field metaphysics

of

James’s later philosophy. In the

Principks,

James

ma intains that he is restricting himself to a descript ion of experience, to the

structure

of

the m ind; he is bracketing the question o f “external” reality.

Whenhe ettisons thisontologicaldualism n he Essays in R a d i c d Em-

per ic i sm, he is able to ask, som ew ha t rhetorically, “S ho uld w c no t say here

that

to

be experienccd

as

cont inuous

is

to be really co ntinu ou s, in a world

where experience and reali ty co m e to the sam e th ing ?”

E R E ,

30). In recall-

ing here that for the pragm atists experienc e

s

the only pathway

o

an y spec-

ulation

or

extrapo lation conc erning the gene ral character

of

reality,

I

am



stressing h ow different is thc claim that changc or co nti nu ou s tran sitio n is

felt when that claim is understood not merely as a psychological description

but as an expression of ou r dccpest and most int imate penctrat ion into eal-

ity. Co nsid er, for exa m ple, how significantly differcnt are the implications

of the fol lowing text , depcnding on whichof these perspectives is assumed:

“In the same ct by wh ich I feel that this passing m inu te

is

a new pulse o f m y

life, I feel that the old life con tinuc s into it,and the fecling of continuance in

no wise jars upo n the simultan eous fecling o f novcIty. They , too, com pene -

tratc harm oniou sly” ( E R E , 46-47).

T h e fuIler implication

of

the sclfs fceling its ow n continu ity, w hcreby its

dimension

of

pastness is intimately bound

u p

w ith its dimension of newness,

can be appreciated only after w e have described James’s effort

to

account for

theunity,continuity,and idcnti ty

of

the self in termsof the“passing

T h o u g h t . ” I will a t

that

t ime sugg est that wh en these metaphysical presup-

positions are related to thc “pa ssing Th ou gh t,” wc areble to avoid accoun t-

ing for personal ide ntit y thr ou gh thc substantialist’s underlying principle o r

the transcenden talist’s propertyless transcendcntal cgo. Also avoided, how-

ever, will be that “thinness” and radical ephermerali ty that accom panies a

narrow phenomenalis t interpretat ion of the “passing Thought.”

THE

SENSE

O F

P E R S O N A L

IDENTITY

In the eighteenth century, Th o m as Reid asscrted that “the c onv iction w hich

every man has of his identity, as far back as his memory reaches, needs n o

aid of phi losophy to strengthen it , and

n o

philosophy can weaken it , with-

ou t f irst producing somc degree o f insanity.”*0 W hether philosophy can

strengthen o r weaken this con victio n may

be disputed, but there can bc no

do ub ting that personal identity has been

a

matter of continuing philosoph-

ical controversy.“Evidently,”Whiteheadstates, “th ere is

a

fact to

be

ac-

counted for”; hence,every philosophy “must provide some doctr ineof per-

sonal identity.”” This holds even if

one

conclud es that personal identity is

an

i llusion, for on e w ou ld still have to explain w hy hu m an be ings are

so

universally and persistently saddled w ith such an illusion-the task of such

thinkers

as

the Hum cans and the Buddh ists , w ho de ny the reali ty o f the

self. Jam es him self has been interpreted

as

present ing,

if

on ly implicitly,

a

view

of

the self

that

denies the reality of the subject, or

ego. I

will conten d

that in spite of

a

num ber

of

rnislcading texts,

such

an interpretation is

in

conflict with the deep er strains

of

his philosophy

when

considered in

its

overall thrust.13Unless I canestablish hisclaim, m y effort toem ploy

James’s d oc trine of the

self

as

a

gro un d for belief in pe rsonal imm ortality

will be radically u nd erm ined . H enc e the necessity for the close and detailed

consideration of som e sub tlc an d lusive features of James’s d oc trine.

Rccall that the central feature ofjam es’s des criptio n of the em pirica l self

(me) was that in all its ma nifesta tions it is experienced as

an

object . The

question that inevitably follows,

of

course,

is

who

or

what

is do ing the expe-



ricncing, 1 J wh ich finally brings James to

a

consideration

of

“ the I , or pure

Ego,” w hich he had bracketed whilc dcscribing the empirical sclf.

I n

his

Psycldogy: BYie@Y C u t m e , James

a dm i t s

that “the I , o r ‘pure ego,’ is a very

much more diffrcult subject

of

inquiry than the

M e .

It is that which

a t

any

given m om ent

is

conscious, whcreas the Me is on ly oneof the things which

it

is

conscious o j ”

Hc

goes o n

to

say that the reference hcre is to thc

Thillker,

which immediately gives rise to thc question ,

“Whatis

the Thinker?” James

will eventually answer, the “passing T ho u gh t”

o r

thc “passing s ta te ofc on -

sciousness.” At the ou tse t, howcver, he acknowledges that the passing state

is the embodiment of change, “yet each o f us spontaneously considers that

by ‘I,’ he means someth ing always the samc” ( P B C , 175). I t is this

sense of

sameness or personal identity that must now bc explored in or dc r

to

detcr-

mine whether there is an alternative to thc three traditional accounts of this

phcnornenon-substantialism, transcende ntalism, and associationism.

Therc can be n o doubt that I feel I am the same person today that I was

yesterday, but it may

be

asked w he the r this feeling expresses fact or illusion,

w heth er in reality “ I am

the

same s e l f t h u t I was yesterday” (PP,

I:316).

Or, as

James cxprcssed it later,

41s

the snrne~lesspvedicared eally

there?”

(P’BC,180).It

must be dctermined jus t what is meant when consciousncss “calls the pre-

sent seIf thc

rnrne

with one of thepast sclves wh ich it has in mi nd .” T h ekey

here is the feeling of “w arm th an d int im ac y” that charactcrizcs

our

prcsent

th o u g h t o r self. We receive “an unceasing sense o f personal existence”

f rom

the “w ar m th ” that characterizes “th e feeling wh ich w e have of the thought

itself , as thi n ki n g ,” an d/ or “t he eeling o f the body’s actual existence a t the

m om en t.” We idcntify with those distant selves who are remembered with

warm th and int imacy, and those alone are

so

remcm bcred who were ini-

tially experienced with warmth and intimacy. James illustrates this point by

com par ing our though ts to

a

herd

of

cattle. Just

as

a t

roundup t ime the

owner picks out from a larger herd those cat& bcaring his brand ,

so

w e

gathcr tog eth er ou t of a larger collcction of thoughts those bearing our

brand-“warmth and intimacy.” When we add the feeling

of

corrtinuity that

we remember when referring to mo re dis tant

sclves

and pcrccive as ou r

present self continu ally fades into the past, weave the twocharacteristics of

personal identity-resemblance an d co nti nu ity (PP,

1:316-18).

N o w i t s h o u l d

e

noted that James maintains a t

this

point

thc

sam e criteria

for

the sameness perceived in the self and thc sam ene ss perceived

in

other

phenomena.Further,Jamescautions us againstclaiming m or e unity or

sarnencss than is warranted

by

cxperience, such as “metaphysical or abso-

lute U nit y in

which

all the differences arc ov erw he lm ed . T he past and pre-

sent selves compared are the same just o far forth

as

they are the same, and

n o

far ther .” T here is then

both

gcneric unity

and

generic

difference coexist-

ing

S O that

“f rom the one poin t o fview they are on e self, fro m oth ers they

are as truly not one but ma ny

clves.”

Finally, this sense of personal identity

vanishes when “the resemblance and the continuity are

n o

longer

felt”

(PP,

I:338).



In so describing persona l identity, Jamc s notcs that he has on ly givcn a

version

of

“th e o rdin ary do ctr in c professed by thc em pirical sch001 .”~~t

this point, howcver, he diverge s from thc traditional empircists, chargin g

that “these writcrs have ncglectcd certain rnorc subtlc aspects o f the Unity

of Consciousness” ( P P , I:319).What is missing from the em pirical doctr ine

is

thc character of owne rship belonging

to

ou r tho ug hts . Rcverting to his

herd me taphor, Jame s states: “No bcast would

be

so branded unless he be-

longed to the owncrof the herd . Th ey arc no t is becausc thcy are brand ed;

they are brande d because thcy arc his.” It is this recogn ition that thougflts

are owne d which leads com m on sense to pos it “a purc spiritual entity of

some kind” as the “rcal O w ne r” (PP, I:319-20). Stated in othe r terms , what

is absent in traditional em piricism

is

an ackno wled gm ent that

a

multiplicity

of individua l thoug hts can be integrated only by means of a medium.

In

contradistinction to this em pirical doctrine, Jam es ma intains that in his ac-

coun t “the me dium is fullyassigned

.

.

.

in the shape

of

something

not

am ong the things collected, b ut superior to them all, nam cly, the rcal, pre-

sent onlooking, rerncmbering, ‘ judging tho ugh t’ or identifying ‘scction’ of

the s tream” (PP, 1:320-21).’”

Th ou gh yielding much , according toJames, this assumption still docs no t

satisfy thedemands

of

common sense ,since theunity achieved b y h e

Thought( thepresentme ntal s tatc) “do esnot existunti l th e Th ou gh t is

there.” This

is equivalent

to

a ncw settler lassoing wild cattle and ow nin g

them for the first time. Bu t the claim of

common

sense

is

that past thou gh ts

were a lways own ed, and this sugges ts that the Thoug ht has

a

“subs~ant ia l

identitywith

a

formerwner,-notmereontinuity or resem-

blance . . but

a

veal unity.” While James concedes that the “Soul” and the

“Transcendental Ego” are a t tempts toatisfy thisu r gen t dem and o f com m on

sense,

he

advances an alternative hypothesis

to

account for “that appearance

of never-lapsing ownership” (PP, I:321). H o w w o u l d it

be,

he asks, “if the

Thought , the present judging Thought , ins tead ofbeing in anyay substan-

tially or transcendentally identical w ith the fo rm e r owner of the past self,

merely inherited his ‘title,’ and thu s sto od as his legal representative now?”

(PP,

I:321).

James goes on to sugges t that jus ts a long success ion of herdsm en mig ht

come n to

possession

by herapid ransmission of he original i tle o f

ownership,

s o

m igh t “th e ‘title’

of

acollective self be passcd fr o m o n e

T h o u g h t to another .” Something very m uch l ike this patently occurs

when

“each pulse

of

cognitive consciousness, each T h o u g h t, dies away and is re-

placed

by

another.” In this stream

of

succession each later T h ou gh t, recog-

nizing the earlier T h ou gh ts

as

“warm ,” appropriates them and greets them

saying: “Thou art mine, and par t of the same self with me.” Hence, “each

Th oug ht is thus born a n ow ner, and dies ow ned, transmitting wh atever it

realized as its Self

to

its own later proprietor.” Jam es

is

sugges t ing, then,

a

process

of

“adopt ion”

o r

“appropr iat ion”whereby hepresent“pass ing

Thought’ ’ adopts or app ropriates the previo us T hou ght a nd all i t includes,



which T ho ug ht had in turn adop ted the prcviou s T hou ght all the way back

to the ini tial m om en t of T h ou g ht . James concludes: “Who ow ns the ast self

ow ns th e self befo rc thc last, for w hat possesses t he possessor possesses the

possessed”

(PP, I:321-22).

W hile claiming that this sketch includes all the

vevlfiable

features

in

per-

sonal identity, James do es ad m it that the act qf appropriatiorz

is

somewhat

obscure, inasmuch

as “a

thing cann ot appro priate tself ; i t

is

itself.” Still less,

James continues, can it disown itself, since “there must be an agent of the

appro priating and disow ning.” This agen t as already been nam ed: “it is the

T h o u g h t to w h o m t h evarious‘constituents’ are k n o w n ”

( P P J I:322-23).

Nevertheless , his Th ou gh t ca nn ot beanobject to itself, no r can t ever

appropriatc or disown tself:

“ I t

appropriates

f a

itself, it is the actual focus o f

accretion, the ho ok from wh ich the chain o f past selves dangles, planted

firmly in the Present , which aloneasses for real, and thus kee ping the hain

from being

a

purely ideal thing” ( P P , I:323).

The present moment

of

consciousness, however, is “the darkest in the

whole ser ies,” for “nothingcan be know n about it till it be dead and gone.”

James concedes that “it may feel i ts ow n im m ed iat eexistence,,; neve rtheless,

Its appropriations are .

. .

less to itselfthan

to

the mo st intimately felt

p o r t

ofits

preserlr

O b j e c t ,

the

body,

a n d

The

cerltral adjtrstruettts,

which accompany the

act

of

thinking , in the head.

These

are

the

veal

nrrclerrs ofouvperrona l ident i ty”

(PP,

I:323).With this text that am big uity of the body, previously discussed,

surfaces again. Further, despite the qualification “less to i tself’ conc erning

the Tho ught’s approp riations, and the fact that a few lines before he main-

tained that the Thought “appropriates to itself,’’ it is easy t o see w h y James’s

doctrine of the “pass ing T ho ug ht as the Thinker” might be interpreted as a

“no-self’ doctrine.

If

all doctrines that deny the presence in the stream

of

experience

of

any

essentially u ncha nging principle rema ining absolutely identical a t all mo-

ments of its existence arc designated “no-self” doctrincs, then James’s view

falls into this classification. Th is no tion of identity, however, which b y defi-

nition restricts it to unc ha ng ing realities, is wha t Jam es is challenging. His

challenge here is part of his broad metap hysical challenge to the view that

reality in i ts essential struc ture is p erm ane nt or immutable. If existentiaI

beings are essentially changing beings, then the only identity they can pos-

sess m us t be that p eculiar

to

such beings.

The

numerica1 o r sub stantial

iden-

tity characteristic of static beings must be disting uishe d from the relative or

functional iden tity characteristic of changing beings. Hence, James m ain-

tains that the identity discovered by the

“I”

can be only

“a

relative iden tity,

that of a slow shifting in wh ich there is always so m e common ingredient

retained.

*’

He

goes o n

to

say that the identity which the “ I” finds in its “ m e” is only

“a

loosely con strued thing, an identi ty ‘on the whole’

”

(PPJ :352). In his

Psychlogy:

Brie&

Course,

James denies any

substantial

identity between yes-

6 6 .



J a m e s :

Persorral I d e n t i t y

89

terday’s and today’s states of consciousness, “for w he n on e is here the oth er

is irrevocably dead and g on e.” Th ey d o possess firnctional identity, however,

since both know the sam e objects-including the by go ne me-to w hich

they react in an identical way, calling it their o w n in opp os itio n

to

all the

other things they know . Jam es concludes: “Th is functiona l identity seem s

really the only sort of identity in the thinker wh ich the facts require

us

to

suppose. Successive thinkers, numerically distinct, but all aware of the same

past in the same way, form an adequ ate vehicle fo r all the exp erien ce of

personal unity and same ness wh ich we actually have” ( P B C ,

181).*9

Thus ,

James’s “passing Th ou gh t” do ctr ine excludes any view of the self as

sub-

stuance,

but I will later sugg est that wh en com bined with the iews on the self

that emerge in his last philosophy, the “passing Thought” an be reconciled

with a substantive view of the self.

First, how ever, it will be helpful to consider briefly James’s arguments

against the three traditional accounts of persona l identity.

I

am concerned

here no t so m uc h w ith the istorical accuracy o r fairness o f his interpretation

but

rather with what his criticisms tell us ab ou t his

own

doctr ine and their

implications for the field model

of

the self that

I

am endeavoring to

construct.

Jame s begins with an analysis

of

substantialism, which posits the soul

as

the nonp heno rnenal, und erlying, unch anging principle allegedly responsi-

ble for the unity, continuity, and identi ty belonging

o

the self. In

m y

earlier

treatment of pragmatism’s rejection

of

dualism,

I

noted that James does no t

ciaim to prove the nonexistence of the soul; rather,

he

rejects it

because

he

judges

it useless as

an

explan atory principle.

For

exam ple, the

soul

w ould

fulfill the need for that m ed iu m

of

union that Jam es fo und absent in ssocia-

tionism , but in rnercly asserting that distinct ideas and experiences are uni-

fied

“by

a

unifying act

of

the

soul,

you

say

little more than that

now

they

are

united, uniess you give

some

hint

as

to how the soul uni tes them”EP, 85).

It

is this “how,” James maintains, that his “passing Th ou gh t” hypo thesis ac-

counts for,

and

does so withou t positing any principle behind or

beyond

the

“phenomena1

and temp oraI facts”

(PP,

1:326-27). Co nsider the claims of

simplicityandsubstantialitymade

for

thesoul.Jameshasdescribed his

“ T h o u g h t ”

by

the metaphor “Stream” to convey its absence of “separable

parts.” Hence, it can be said to be “ simple.”

A s

fo r substantiality, “t he

pre-

sent Thought also

has

being,-at lcast

all

believers

in

the

Soul

believe

so-

and if

there

be

n o Being in wh ich it ‘inheres,’ i t oug ht itself

to

be

a ‘sub-

stance.’ ” Desp ite these sim ilarities, if similarities they

indeed

be, the dif-

ferences between the two doctrines s even

more

str iking.

T h e Thought is a perishing and not an immortal o r incorruptible thing. Its

successors may continuously succeed

to

i t , resemble

it,

and appropriate it, but

they are not i t , whereas the Soul-Substance

is

supposed to be a

fixed

unchang-

ing thing.

B y

the Soul is always meant something b e h i d the present Thought,

another

kind

of substance,

existing

on

a non-phenomenal plane.

(PP,

1:327)



What James is affirming m ay not be compictcly clear, but what

he is

rejcct-

ing most certainly

is.

W hatever th e self may positivcly be, it is no t “a fixed

unchanging thing” or shadow reality located in a wo rld o ntologically diffcr-

ent

from

the world

we

expericncc.

James b egins his consideration of the associat ionist theory by com me nd-

ing

Lockc

for having grasped that “the jwpor rnn t unity of the

Self

was its

verifiable and

felt

unity,” accomp anied by

a

s o ~ ~ s c ~ o c ~ s ~ ~ e s sf diversity. It was

Hume, however , who

“showed how

grcat heconsciousness of diversity

actually

was.”

Nevcr thclcss , Hume cnds

up

as the mirror inlagcof thc sub-

stantialists: they say “t h e Self is nothing b u t Un ity,” wh ile he says “it is

nothing but Diversity.”

Humc

denies thephenomenal“thread” of

re-

semblance

“or

core

of

sameness” that lames contends s acknowlcdged

in

his

“passing Th ou gh t” hypothesis . T h e crucial deficiency in H u m c and all the

other associationists is their failure to rec ognize the connectedness that

is

given in experience. According to Hulne, “AI /OW

dirtjrlct

yerrpptiatlr

are

d i s -

tinst existences, arrd the mirrd trever perceives nrry teal conrtecriosl arttarzg dis-

tinct exisfences.”20 James, however, insists that w ith in the stre am of experi-

ence the connections arc jus t

as

“rcal”

as

the separations. This is the crucial

point a t w hich the difference in the meaning of “expcrience” significantly

separates

James

and he other pragmatis ts

from

the classical

empiricists.

This difference is explicit in the statem en tof fact and generalized conclusion

that

characterizes James’s radical empiricism.

The statement of fact is that the relations betwcen things, conjunctivc

s

well

as disjunctive, are just

s

much mat te rs of direct particular experience, neither

m o r e so nor less SO, than

the

things themselves.

T h e generalized conclusion is that therefore the parts of experience hold

together from next to nextby rclations that are themselvesparts of experience.

T h e directly apprehended universe needs, in short, n o extraneous trans-ern-

pirical connective support , but possesses in its own

right

a concatenated or

continuous s t ruc ture . ( M T ,

7)

This

is

a key example of a claim presented as “psych ological” in

Tile

Prim’ples of

Psychology

having becom e “metaphysical” in Essays i t / .

Rndicd

Empir ic ism.

Presc indmg from the psycho2ogical/metaphysical ques t ion, the

important poin t here is that James mak es relations

of

con nect ion jus t as

m uc h mat ters

of

direct exper ience

as

relations

of

separat ion. Both the

asso-

ciationists and the t ranscendenths ts presuppose an ex per ience comp ris ing

a succession of separate or discrete ideas

or

sensations. The associationists,

ma intaining that these “distinct existences” are un co nn ec ted , must limit

any connec t ion or uni ty to some psychologrcalact in accor dance w i th

vague

“laws of association.” The transcendentalists, on the o ther hand,

accept ing the same assumption

of

exper ience

as a

succession of d w x e t e

psychic atoms, posit a “transcen dental Ego” as the necessary condition for

un it in g this mu ltiplicity. James discusses

John

Stuar t

Mdl

and I m m anue l

Kant as representatives of these two approaches.



Though an associationist,Mill,according to James,

comes

perilously

close to positing som ething like thc Soul wh en he speak sof “ thc ilrexplicable

t i t

. . . which conn ects the present consciousness with thc past one.” Since

Mill goes on

to

rcfer to this “t ie” as “som ething in co m m on ” and “perma-

nent” (PP, I:338), ames sees here “metaphysical Substancc come again to

life.”” B ut Mill makes the same blunder

as

Hurne: “The sensations per se,

he thinks, have n o ‘tie.’ T h e tie

of

rescmblancc and co ntinuity wh ich the

remem ber ing Thou ght finds amo ng thcm is not

a

‘real tie’ but ‘a mere

pro du ct of the laws of thoug ht’ ; an d th e fact that the presen t Th oug ht ‘ap-

propriates’ them is also no real tie”

(P P ,

I:340).

James takcs Kant as representativc of the transccnden talist theory. Kant

posits the ranscend ental

E g o

as necessary

to

bring unity

to

the original

manifold of sensation. N o te a gain the assum ption that the basic building

blocks of knowledge-the data of sensation-arc in themselvesuncon-

nected and hcncc in need o f S O M C transcendental principle

of

unity, which

for Ka nt is the pure Ego .22 Thiss not

the

Soul,

howevcr, since w c can kn ow

nothin g posi tive abou t i t , inasm uch as it “has no properties, and fro m it

nothin g can

be deduced.” Granting that “k no win g m ust have a vehicle” by

which thc “many ” is known, the cornplcte em ptiness of the transcendcntal

Ego

cxcuses Jame s fr o m accepting it rather than his own “pre sen t passing

T h o u g h t . ” 111 unusually harsh language

for

James, he dismisses thc E g o as

“only

a

‘cheap and nasty’ edition

of

the soul .

.

. as ineffectual and windy an

abor t ion as Philosophy can show” (PP, I:341-45).

In

sum, then, Jamcss view of thc s t ructure

f

experience and/or reality is

concatenated and continuous as well as disconn ected and disco ntinuous. All

experiences and rcalitics are con nec ted and con tinuo us with oth cr experi-

ences and realities, bu t ev cry experience an d reality is not imme diately

or

directly connected

a nd

cont inuous wi th

evcry

o th cr expcricnce and reality.

Given such

a

world, there

is

n o

nced

to posit either

a

substantial o r transcen-

dental

“glue”

to hold ogetherontoIogical lyseparate realities. T h c

soul

a n d / o r transcendental Ego have bcen

prcsented as

the “gluei’ that holds the

discrete clements

of

the Self together, and

God

or the Absolute has been

claimed necessary to account for thc unity

of

the world .

I f

substantialisnl and transcendentalism

felt

compelled to go bcyond cxpe-

rience

to

account for the “m ed ium of union” or the “vchiclc

of

knowing,”

associationism faded to re cog nize thc need

for

such

a

m e d i u m

or

vehicle.

James can claim to both agrce and disagree with elcme nts

in

all thrce theo-

ries, since he maintains the

n e e d for

a

“m ed ium ” bu t locates it within the

stream

of experience-that “scction” of thc s tream that

he

has designated

the “pass ing Th ou gh t .” This is by n o m e a n s a problem -free claim; as pre-

viously mentioned, the notion of the “passing Th ou gh t” has

been

viewed as

inclining Jarncs in thc dircc tion of a “no-sclf‘” do ctri ne .

I

would l ike now

to

explore the ‘‘passing T h o u g h t” in relation to the self w ith

a

view

to

seeing it

as,

if

not

fully

consistent with the mo re substantive self

of

James’s later

philosophy, a t least not in irrcpa rable op position to it.



92

Persotla1

Irrrrrrortal i ty:

Possibility

arzd Credibility

FIELD-SELF:

EARLY

SIGNS

Milic Capek maintains that “the dis tance between the ‘perishing thought’

f

The Principles of

Psychology

and‘the full se lf of A

Plurulistic

Urliverse is

considerable.”

In the first period, we find consciousness floating

over

a limited region

of

the

brain, following passiveiy the shifting maximum of

the

physiological excita-

tions along

the neural paths; it is a “perishitlg pulse of thought” about which

we are not even certain whether i t

has its

own autonomous and causally e a -

cient reality or is

a

simple epiphenomenon

of

the

brain. In the

last

period, we

face a

genuinely creative activity

whose

conscious moment

is only a

limited

manifestation of the whole personal life, embedded in the larger cosmic self

without

being

absorbed in

i t .23

I will later focus onJarnes’s “full self’ do ctrine , w hich Ca pe k, n op po sition

to Dewey and other beha vioristic interpretcrs, has m ost persuasively em-

phasized. His essay remains a splendid description o f th e various stages o f

the development of ames’s do ctrin e of theelf, as well as

of

the conflicts a nd

inconsistencies bo th w ithin a nd am on g th e various stages. Nevertheless,

as

oth er passages in Capek’s essay wo uld show , the description

of

the “first

period” in the text just cited is quite misleading if taken as the full story

of

the self in James’s early philosoph y. M y conc ern,

as

frequently noted, is not

to present James’s do ctr inc wit h all its shades and variations but rather to

select from his writin gs tho se features I believe most serviceablefor the

construction of

a

field view o f the self, W hile it s no t possible to com pletely

igno re certa in shifts and ifficulties, 1 will continue

to

touch upo n these only

insofar as they contribute to

m y

central purpose. Show ing that ven in those

places wh ere James’s doctrine seem s mo st cong enial to a bchav ioristic or

“no-self’ interpretation there are resources for

a

field-self streng then s the

case for the latter view. Similarly, indicating a t least the lack o f any essential

oppo sition betwe en the mo re “em pirical” self of the early James and the

mo re “m ystical” self of the late Jam es protects thc forme r from positivistic

closureand the atter

from

floating off in to

a

r e a lm

of

merelywishful

abstractions.

Recall no w

a

few of the earlier stated assu m ption s in term s of which

I

am

describing James’s self. T h e three funda me ntal field suppositions suggested

by James himself we re

“ ( I )

‘Fields’ that ‘develop,’ un de r the categories o f

con tinuity w ith each other . . . 2) Bu t no thin g postulated whose whatness

is not

of s o m e nulure given in fields. .

. .

(3) All the f ields com m on ly sup-

posed are incom plete and point

o a

complement beyond hei r own content”

(TC,

I1:365). I earlier suggested that the self be un de rstoo d as the widest

enco mp assing field in relation

to

the plurality of the c on stituting subfields

w ithin its com pa ss bu t no t in relation

to

the wide r fields within wh ose

compass the self exists.

Bea ring these presupp ositions in mind , let

us

see how w e

might

under-

stand the self described in The Principles

ofPsychology.

James gives two

sum-



mary statements of his view. In th e first he says that “persona lity implies the

incessant presence

of

tw o elem en ts, an objective person, kno wn by

a

pass-

ing subjective T h ou gh t and recognized

as

con tinuin g in time.

Hereafier /e t 14s

use

the

words

M E

am i

I

fur

t h e

empirical

person

and

t h e

judging

Tllought”

( P P ,

1:350).

Later

in

the sam e chapter he states: “T he consciousness

of

Self in-

volves a

s t ream of thoug ht , ach par t of w hic h

as ‘I’

can

(1)

r em em b er t h o se

which w ent before, and know the things they knew; and 2) emphasize and

care param ountly for certain ones amo ng them as ‘me,’ and appropriate to

these

the rest . T h e nucleus of th e ‘me’ is always the bo dily existence felt to

be

present at the t im e”

( P P , 1:378).

N ow ho w are w e to understand these far

f r o m

clear and distinct texts?

First , they m igh t be und ersto od dualistically, in w hich case the

“I”

and the

“me” would

be

two essentially different principles, the

“ I ”

being the under-

lying principle that unifies the phenomena into

a “me.”

Second, they might

be understood epiphenom enally, in which case the objective body w ould

alone be real, w hile thc

“ I ”

would

be

merely

an

cp iphenomenon em erg ing

as the result of the activity o f the b ody, in particular the brain. W hile there

are grounds

in

Jam es for bo th these interpretations, I believe the re are far

better groun ds for anoth er :namely, a transactional or field interpretation.

In

a

transactional o r field view, th e pri m ary reality

is

the concrete f lowing

field o r stream within which specific fields o r functions are distinguished.

Let us unde rstand “the

sc lf ’

as this con crete flowing

field

or s t r eam wi th the

caution that “w ithi n” is not to be unders tood as “wi th in

a

container .” T he

self is not a container but a field o r relational process constituted b y a multi-

plicity of such processes. Further, since al l processes,

in

accordance with one

of ou r key metaphysical assumptions, are t ransactional , there are no pro-

cesses

or

fields existing “in themselves.” All fields o r realities are relational,

and wh ile the poles o f the relation can be distinguished, they cannot

be

separated. Thus any uni typossessed by a field

is

inseparably bound up wi th

a

multiplicity

of

functions

or

subfields.W hen he extscitedaboveare

viewed fro m this field o r transactional perspective, the

“I”

and the “me”

are

seen

to

have their reality only correlatively o r in transactional activity. Nei-

ther

the “ I” nor the

“me”

has an y reality a part

from

the other ,since that they

are and

what

they

are

is determin ed by processes o f co-consti tut ion. T h e

distinction, however, is proper and defensible because the “I” and the “me”

refer t o different functions

a n d

perspectives of o ne a nd the same self. T h e

self

is th us subjective-objective, these being derivative relational functions

of

the con crete flowing field or s t r eam . Th e imp or tan t po in t here

is

that the

“subjective

I”

and the “objective m e ” are equally real since, as correlatives, i t

is

not possible to have one witho ut the other . H ence the em pir ical , o bject ive

self

considered apart from the subjective

I ”

is

just as

much

an

abstraction

as

the subjective “I” considered apar t f rom the em pirical objective self. W hile

for a particular purpo se i t migh t be legitimate to focus o n either

of

these

poles w ith ou t specific reference

to

the o ther , when w e are faithful

to

the

experience

of

the self in its concreteness, both must be held

together.



94

P e r s o t i d I t ii n z o v tn l i ty : P o s s i b i l i t y arid C r e d i b i l i t y

It is misleading, therefore, to take James’s view on the “passing Thought

as the thinker,” isolate it from the full self, and interpret it as a doctrine of

egolessness or of “the vanishing subject.” There is

a

sense in which James

dissolves and denies the ego, and it is the same sense in which he dissolves

and denies consciousness: he denies both insofar as they are understood as

entities, but he affirms both insofar as they are understood as processive-

relational functions.24Thus we might say that there is

a

function or activity

of the self whereby the self grows, cumulates, appropriates, and inherits,

and this activity is designated the “passing Thought” or the “I.” The “I,”

then, is as real as these functions and subject to the same metaphysical con-

ditions; that is, it has no reality in itself or in isolation from its “objects,” key

among which is the “me.”35 To question the reality of the

“I”

because it

cannot be directly known as it is in itself apart from its activities is to restrict

the meaning of “I” to either a substantial principle or a transcendental Ego.

It is just such a restriction that is denied by the effort to describe the “I” as a

transactional process located within the concrete stream of experience.

I believe that James was at least moving toward such a transactional Ego

even in The

Principles

o

Psychology: “The unity, the identity, the indi-

viduality, and the immateriality that appear in psychic life are thus ac-

counted for as phenomenal and temporal facts exclusively, and with no need

of reference to any more simple or substantial agent than the present

Thought or ‘section’ of the stream”

(PP ,

I:326-27). Two points to note here

are, first, that while James denies the need for a “substantial agent” as a

transempirical reality, he does affirm the reality of an agent; second, that this

agent is the “present Thought,” which is a “section” of the stream of experi-

ence. These same two features were encountered earlier when James, in op-

position to the associationists, insisted on the need for a “medium” of unity

and identity. He described this medium as “the real, present onlooking,

remembering, ‘judging thought’ or identifying ‘section’ of the stream” (PP,

I:321). If we are to make any sense of this view we must constantly resist the

tendency to think in terms solely of static concepts and continually bear in

mind James’s admonition that the flux of experience can be participated in

and pointed at but can never be adequately described in concepts or words

which by their very nature tend to be static.

Take, for example, James’s use of the term “section” in referring to the

passing Thought or identifying activity.

I t

is not accidental that this term is

placed in quotation marks, since to take it literally would be nonsensical.

The “I” as a “section” of the stream cannot be unqualifiedly the same as

“Queens” as a section of New York City. Yet the use of the term “section”

has some legitimacy, since James is trying to point to that activity within the

stream of experience whereby the stream appropriates and unifies. This ex-

pression has the advantage of avoiding any transempirical “I” while taking

account of a distinctive activity or process of the self or stream of experi-

ence.26 Hence, the distinction between the

“ I ”

and the “me” is one of focus



Jnwies: Persorznl lderttity 95

and function. This avoids any dualistic reification as well as any dissolution

of the “I” into an illusory epiphenomenon or grammatical fiction acciden-

tally attached to

a

totally objective “real” self.

All of this has been by way of suggesting that even in James’s early doc-

trine, the “self’ was wider and more inclusive than the “passing Thought.”

The self, therefore, is inclusive of the “I”

and the “me” in such fashion as to

be wholly both, that is, the self is

“I”

through and through and “me”

through and through. If this makes any sense at all, and I am not sure it

does, it makes sense only in light of the previously described transactional

relation between “I” and “me.” The self as “I” does not possess an additiotzal

part called “me,” or vice versa. It is one and the same self, whether grasped

as

“I”

or “me.” When it experiences itself as object or as the receptor of

other activities, it says “me.” When it feels itself as subject or as the initiator

of activities, it says “I.” While acts do not happen to “I” and “me” does not

act, it is one and the same self that acts and is acted upon. If the “I” remains

elusive in such a view

of

the self, it is because the self as continuously chang-

ing is always in a sense ahead of itself. This is why, when James introspec-

tively turns, he can not locate any reality other than the objective reality of

the empirical self or “me.”27The “acting part” of the self, the “I” has al-

ready moved on, as it were, and becomes “known” only in its residual mode

of past selves. Throughout this process, however, there is a feeling of the

process, an experience of activity,

a

feeling of tendencies,

a

feeling of effort,

none

of

which reduces to objectively known realities.

I t

is the self as a tem-

poral or continuously changing process-which, though real, defies objec-

tification-that is a central feature of the field-self suggested in this essay.

SELF AS CEN TER ED-A CTIV ITY FIELD

Assuming, now, that the “passing Thought” is

a

function of

a

wider, fuller,

and more inclusive self, I will henceforth refer to the “self’ without at-

tempting to restrict the characteristic under consideration to any specific

aspect or function of this self. I am, of course, proceeding within the pre-

viously described framework of a metaphysics of fields in which the self is

understood as a complex of fields or relational processes. Further, as we have

already seen, this self has a unity and identity proper to such a complex: that

is, a unity amidst plurality and an identity amidst change. In what follows, I

will increasingly though not exclusively draw upon the later James. When

I

do utilize texts from The Principles qfPsychology, I will not use them in their

earlier, more restricted sense. My justification for this

is

that whatever can

properly be predicated of a particular function of the self can also be predi-

cated of the whole or fuller self. Thus, for example, if it is correct to say that

the “passing Thought” cumulates or appropriates past selves, then it is also

correct to say that the self is characterized by a cumulating or appropriating

activity whereby it is continually changing while retaining in some fashion

its earlier modes of being.28



96

T h e first characteristic of selves that m igh t be no teds that they are centers

of activity. This, of course, does no t distin gu ish them , for s we earlier saw,

all

discrete realities are centcrs of activity. Co nc ern ing that plurality wh ich s

a

feature

of

the universe, James pointed

out

that

“efectioely

there are centres

of

reference and action”

(TC,

II:764). Also noted was Dewey’s contention

that “in a genu ine althoug h not psych ic sense, natural b eings ex hibit prefer-

ence and c e n t e r e d n e ~ s . ’ ’ ~ ~suggested that panactivism

is

a more accurate

description of reality han panp sychism . Thu s, wh ile centered activity

is

affirmed as the m ark of all real being s, thereby exclud ing any com pletely

passive entities,3” the term “ps yc hic,” or “consc ious,” will be restricted to

describing

a

specif ic mo de or m ode sof centered activity. Selves as cen ters of

activity, therefore, are not

unique

o r distinctive, since reality is

a

plurality of

such centers, Inasmuch as

we

have rejected any ontolog ical dualism , the

distinctive character of selves cann ot be located in a realm or m od e of e ing

“outside” or “beyond” the s t reamof experience. Any distinction, therefore,

mus t be due to the scope and complexity f th e self field that determ ines its

powers of com mu nication and initiation. Hen ce, consciousness will no t be

some totally new or co m plete ly different kind of being unrelated to and

radically discontinuouswithnonconscious entities or fields; rather,con-

sciousness will be an activ ity

of

tho se fields that have

a

wider range and

greater com plexity than the fields that are encom passed b y consciousness

and with wh ich i t is con tinuous.

In describing the self as

a

centered-activity field, of course, there is n o

posit ing of anystatic, unchanging center. Again, the controllingfield m eta-

phor mus t be kept in mind . The “center”f a field has no reality apart from

the relations that con stitute the full field

as

well as the cen ter itself. H ea ce ,

inasmuch as the field is continu ally chan ging and shiftingn relation to other

fields,

so

the center

of

every field is also con tinually ch anging and shifting.

Th is is not to sug ges t that all relations are ch ang ing a t the

same

rate

or

that

all centers change and shift at the sam e rates; there is a vast range

of

dif-

ferences b oth am on g fields and within a particular field. Thes e differences

are manifested in the variations in stability am on g individuals.

In

T h e

Vuri-

d e s ofRefigious

Exper ience ,

James calls attention to bo th the eality

of

and the

shifts in o u r centers of energy. He notes that even am ong the Bu ddh is ts and

Humeans , or

whom

“ thcsoul is only

a

succession of fields of con-

sciousness: yet there is found in each field

a

part,

or

sub-field, which figures

as focal and c ontains the excitem ent, and from which, as f rom a centre, the

aim seems to be taken.”

James goes o n to speak of “th e ho t place in

a

man’s consciousness, the

g r oup of ideas

to

which he devotes himself , and from which he works,” and

he

calls this

“the

habi tua l centre o his personal energy. . . It makes a great

difference to a ma n wh ether

one

set o f his ideas, o r another,

be

the centre o f

his

energy; and i t makes agreat diEerence,

as

regards any seto f ideas w hich

he may possess, wh ether they b ecom e central or rem ain peripheral in him ”



James: Personal

lderltity

97

( V R E , 161

62).

T h e part icular

use

to w hich James was putting this notion

of a “centre of energy"-in this case, religious conversion-is n o t here of

concern. Independently

of

this

use,

what

is

described is a self whosc life is

always centered, howcvcr much the center

m a y

change

o r

shift.

In s tressin g the fact that the selfs center is constituted

by

sets of ideas,

James is presupposing

a

crucial distinction betwee n

w h a t

might be desig-

nated “activity” and “action.”31 “Sustaining, pcrsevcring , striving, paying

w ith effort as

we

go,

hanging on, and finally achieving our intention-this

is action” (ERE, 92).

T h o u g h

James docs no t explicitly and formally make

the activity-action distinc tion hat has beenarticulatedby contemporary

“action theory” philosoph ers, he recognizes this distinction in rou gh fo rm .

Hedesignates as “ba re activity

.

.

.

the bare fact

of

event or

change.”

I f

there is

such

activity, it would be devoid

of

direc tion , actor, and aim.

B ut in this actual world of ours, as

it

is given, a part a t least of the activity

comes with defini tc direct ion; i t comes with desire

nd

sense

of

goal;

it comes

complicated

with

resistances which i t overcomes or succunlbs to , andwith the

efforts

which

the

feeling of resistance so often

provokes;

and it is

in complex

experiences like these that the notions

of

distinct agents, and

of

passivity as

opposed to activity arise. ( E R E ,

82-83)32

At stake here,of course, is whether the self can prope rly be conside redan

actor, an agent,

a

center of initiation and originationwhose

conscious,

delib-

erate action makes

a

difference b oth to i tself and to the w orld . Th is issue,

variously describcd as “causal efficacy” or the “feeling of effort,” was

a

ma-

jor concern forJames from the beginning

o

the end

of

his philosophical life.

As Perry

points

o u t ,

“James’

scientific stuches dsposed

him

to accept the

view that m an is a ‘conscious automaton.’ . .

.

Consciousness

is

present,

but

has

n o vote; i t supervenes but

does

no t intervene’’

TC,

I:25). But

James

began very early to distrust this

view;

in an 1879 article, “Are We Auto-

mata?”33 he presents cmpirical evidence for the efficacy of consciousness. In

The

Principles ofPsythology, he

finds

it “quite inconceivable

that conscious-

ness sho uld have

nothing

to do with a business which it

s o

fa i th fdly a ttends”

(PP,

I:140). To itself, at least, every actually existing consciousness seem s

“to

be

a

fighterfor ends, o f w hi ch many, bu t for its presence, would no t be

ends

at

all” (PP, I:144).James is willing

to

concede that

“the feeling

of effort

certainly

m a y

be

an iner t accom paniment and not thective elem ent wh ich it

seems”; no m easure me nts are ever

likely

to

be made show ing that effort

“contr ibutes energy to the resul t .” But whi le grant ingo the mechanist that

our feeling

of

having an effect o n reality m ay be an illusion, he insists that

the mechanist grant that i t may

not

(PP , I:428-29). Even in the Principles,

then, James was co nvinced that “however inadequate

o u r

ideas of

causal

efficacy

may

be,

we

are less wide of the mark whenwe say thato ur ideas and

feelings

have it, than the Automatis tsare wh en they say they haven’t it” (PP,

I:

140).



98

Som e years later, after James had articulated his radical em piricism

more

explicitly,

h e

again afflrrncd the reality of causal efficacy, not w ith certainty

but

surely with more confidence. T h e increased confidence clearly

flowed

from

his

more

assured attitude concerning

“feelings”

o r perccptual expcri-

e w e . J am es w as no tu n a w a r c that ma ny able thinkers insisted that m erelyto

feel active is not to be active and tha t “agents that app ear in the cxperience

are no t real agents , the resistances do n o t eally resist, the effccts that a ppea r

are not really effects a t

a l l . ”

Nevertheless, James expressed his own view

w ith passionate firmness:

No matter what activities thcrc may really ben this extra ordinary universeof

ours,

it is impossible for us to conceivc of any one of

them being

either lived

throughorauthentically

known

otherwise than in thisdramaticshapc of

something susta ining a felt purpose agains t felt obstacles, and overcoming

or

being ovcrcom c. W hat “sustaining” mean5 here is clear

to

a n y

om

w h o

has

l ived throu gh heexperience,but to n o

onc

clsc; j u s t as “loud,” “ red ,”

“swect,” mean

so m e t h i n g on ly to bcings with ears, eyes, an d ton gu es. Th e

percipi in thesc origina ls of experience is the

esse; thc

curtain is thc picture.

( E R E , 85)

Later in the same essay, James states “that real cffectual causation as an

ultimatc nature, as

a

‘category,’ if yo u like, of reality, isjust what

w e f 4 e l

it to

be” ( E R E ,93).34 n the posthumously published Sorne Pvoblents

ofPhilosophy,

Jame s ma intains that it is from (‘OU T w n personal activity-situations” that

the notion of causation is derived.

In all thesc what

w e

feel is that

a

previo us field

of

“ c o n s c i o u ~ n e ~ ~ ~ ’ontaining

(in the midst

of

i ts complexity) the

idea

of a resrllt, develops gradually into

another

ficld in which that result appears as accomplished, or else

is

prevented

by obstacles against wh ich we feel

ourselves

to

press.

.

.

.

I t

seems to on e that

in such a

continuously

developing exp eriential series

o u r

concrete perception

of causality is foun d in opera tion. If the word has any me aning at all it must

mean what there

we live

t h rough . ( S PP ,

106)35

Another

way

of expressing all o f this is to say that

as

selves

we

arc ini-

tiators of actions and lives

of

action that really make a difference in th e char-

acter

and

course of the world. Stated

more

simply, we

are to some

exte nt, at

least,

free

beings

who

havc the possibility

of

playing a role in the

develop-

ment of ourselves and

of

rcdity. Thus, as Edie notes , f reedom,

for

James,

“carnc

to

mean the deliberate n c h i e v e t ~ e n tof thc ability

to act:

on himself, on

others , on the wor ld .”36 And ames himself tells us that “th c w ho le feeling

of

reality. the whole sting and excitement

of

our voluntary life, depends on

our sense that in i t things

are r e d l y

beitjg derided

from

one m o m e n t to an-

other, and that it is no t the dull rattling

offof a

chain that was forged innu-

merable ages ago” ( P P , I:429).I n af f i rming “freedom,” James

insists

that

he

is not posi t ing som e “transph eno me nal principle of energy.” Rather, he is

describing that novelty wh ich emerges

from

fresh

“activity-situations.”



If a n activity-proccss is the form of a w h o l e “field of consciousness,”

and

if

cach

field of consciousness is not o d y in i ts totality uniq ue as is now

com-

monly admi t t ed ) bu t

as

its elements un iquc (since in that situation they re all

dyed n he otal),

thcn

novelty is perpetual ly entering hc world

a n d

what

happens there

is

n u t

pure

repet i t ion,

as

thc

dogma

of

l i teral uniformity

of

na tu re

requires. A ctivity-situations come

in

sh or t each with a n original touch.

( E R E , 9311.)

I t

should be noted thata pluralistic-processive world,

a n

“open” and “un-

finished” universe characterized by chancc

and

novclty, is

onc

that does not

reduce freedom to a subjectivistic or psychological aberration. T h e particu-

lar kind

of

world acknow ledged by ames and the othcr pragmatis ts is one in

which there are “original commen cements

of

series

of

phenomena ,

whosc

realization excludcs other series

which

were previously possible” ( C E R , 31).

In another place, James states: “Frec will pragmatically means

novelties

in dzc

world, the right to expe ct tha t in its deepest elements

as

well

as

in its surface

phen om ena, thc future may no t identically repeat and imitate the past” ( P ,

60).

T his insistence on th e relation between freed om and novelty appears

again in Some

P r o b l e m

ofPhilosoyhy, where James maintains t h a t the differ-

ence between mon ism and plural ism ests on the reality o r unreality of nov-

elty.

He

g o e s

on

to

say that the “doctr inc

of

free will”

is

“that we ourselves

may

be authors

of

genuine novelty”

( S P P ,

74-75).

Necdlcss to say,

I am

not presuming to handle the issue of f reedom and

determinism by citing these few texts. M y po in t is sim pl y to indicate that

the

kind of self prop osed here s an agen tcapable thro ug h its efurts of bring-

ing

some

degree of novelty into this ever chan ging wo rld.James

goes

so far

as to suggest that “effort seems .

.

. as if i t were the sub stantive thingwhich

we

are,”

that i t is perhaps “the one strictly undcrived and original contribu-

t ion which we make to the world ” Thus i t is

that

“not

only

our

morality

but our religion, so far as the latter is deliberate, depend on he effort which

we can make. ‘Will

you

or wot l ’ t yor4

have ir

so?’

is the most probing quest ion

w e are cvcr

asked.

. .

.

We answer by

conserlts

OY mn-consents and not

by

words” (PP,

II:11&1-82).

O n e final point concerning human causal activi ty has to do with w ha t

might be called its “m etaphysical implications.” Earlier,

I

stressed that for

pragmatists such as James a nd Dewey, w hatever can be predicated

of

reality

o r the wor ld

in

gene ral mu st in so m e fashion be give n in experience.

This

is

reflected when

James

asks, inreference to the novelties hatresult

from

hum an activity , “w hethe r we are not here witnessing in ou r ow n personal

experience w ha t is really th e esscntial process of creation. Isn’t the world

really growing in thcse activities of ours?’)

( S P P , 108).

I have already

sug-

gested that a world or reality that is con tinua lly gro win g can be viewed as

giving me aning o he belief in personal rnmortality,particularlywhen

h u m a n

persons

are viewed as here and

now

participating in that growth.

Ther e

is,

of

course, no

necessary

connection

between present participation in



IO0 Personal Immortality:

Possibility

aNd

C r e d i b i l i t y

the growth of reality and everlasting life. Still, given the obvious scope and

magni tude

of

the reality process, th e possibility of continuing participation

beyond the short t ime al lot ted in

“this

life”

would

seem to enhance rather

than dim inish

the

meaning

of

o u t

present participation.

This

crucial

and

controversial

claim

that belief in personal im m o rta lity is life-enhancing is

discussed at len gth in later chapters.



C H A P T E R

5

James: Full Sel fand Wider Fields

Pulses of mind lay beating and absorbing beside

my

own little pulse, and together we were a

whole, connecting within this wholeness with

the myriad differing wholes that each f these

people had formed in their lives, were

continuously forming in every

breath

they took,

and through this web, these webs, ran

a

finer

beat, as water

ran everywhere in the stone city

through channels

cut or

built in rock by men

who were able to grade the liftor the fall of the

earth.

”Doris Lessing

Briejirlgfor n Descerrt

irtto

Hell

But

i t

is not man alone who can be properly said

to “connect,” n o r is it human

powers

alone that

are the necessary condition of the functioning of

Connectives. I t is existence cooperating with

man that “connects.”

”John Herm an Randall, Jr.

Na tu re

nr rd Historicnl Experierrce

It is my contention that

a

plausible belief

in

person al imm ortality is inti-

mately bou nd up wi th

a

belief in G od . M or e specifically, I will argue that

the relation between the person and

God must

be such that a belief in per-

sonal immortal i ty has

expe riential groun ds-not groun ds in the sense of

offering a comp elling necessity to infer imm ortality, but in the softer sense

of being basically consistent with and open to such belief. In keeping, then,

wi th this experiential me thodo logy, there

must

be som e “justifying” evi-

dence for the extrapolated belief in a divine-human relationship. T h e prin-

cipal grounds

for

such e xtrapolated belief

are

fou nd in the view of the self

that emerges injarnes’s later writings.

What

I

wish to do now is t ry to co nstru ct the essential features of wh at

James himself calls the “full self,” In ma kin g this

attempt, I

will d raw prin-

cipally upon material from

The

Varieties of Religious Experience, Essays in

Radical Empiricism,

and A

Pluralistic

Universe, without deal ing wi th impor-

tant differences

of

concern and context am ong hese works . Nor will I deal

with inconsistencies, real

or

alleged,

o r

with

a

num ber

of

technical

ques-

101



tions (particularly in RndicaI Enyiricisrn), which a close textual and systcrnat-

ic s tudy wou ld demand. I wis h sim ply to indicatc that thcre is a c o m m o n

thrust

to

these works, as well as to

S ome Problems ofPhilosophy

and several

essays o n psychical research and mysticism. Th is thr us t, as w e shall see,

is

toward articulating

both

the self an d reality in term s of overlapping

fields

of

consciousness. A n alternative way

of

describing this

is

as the tcm poraliza-

tion of real i ty. The stream o r process character of consciousness o r experi-

ence described in The Principles $Psychology is extend ed to all rcality.

T h u s ,

as RalphBartonFerrynotes, “Radical em piricis m consistsessentially in

converting

to

the uses o f metaphysics that ‘stream

of

consciousness’ which

was designated originally for psychology” (TC,

11:586).*

O n e w ay of view-

ing

the relationbetween James’s

Principles

and his ater“metaphysical”

works

is

that n he forme r, mm ediate persona l expe rience or fecling s

viewed psychologically within

a

dualistic m etaphy sics; in the latter, this ex-

perience becomes

the

pa rad igm for all reality as well as the p athwa y to real-

ity in

i ts depth and “thickness.” In A

Pllrralistic U r z i v e n e ,

James insists that

“Bergson is absolutely r ight in contendinghat thc whole

life

of activity and

change is inwardly imp enetrable to conceptu al treatme nt, and that i t opens

itself only to sympathetic apprehension a t the han ds of imm ediate fecling”

( P U ,

123n.).3

EXPERIENCE O F “ S O M E T H I N G M O R E ”

I have already tried t o show

that

even in those sections of

The

PrirJciples

of

Psycho/ogy whereJarnes’s view o f th e elf is m ost capable o f

a

behavioristic or

materialistic interp retatio n, there is evidence of

a

self much fullcr and richer.

I suggested hatreading heseearly extsfrom

a

field perspcctivekeeps

James’s doc trine o pen to the more inclusive self. When we turn to the Iater

James, the case

is

much more com pel ling

for

a

field

view

of the

self

that

more clearly and successfully escapes he egoless, epiph eno mc nal tendencies

earlier evidenced. I no ted that even in those bedeviling texts in w hic hJ am es

seems to identify the self with the bod y-w here the self is ‘ ‘ forwd to consist

mainly of the collections of these peculiar rnotions

i n

the head or

6etr.ueerl

the h em i

arld

throd-e ven hereJames quickly adds that no t for a m o m e n t is hc suggest-

ing “that this

s

all it consists of.” A bit later he explicitly concedes “thatover

and above these there is

an

ob scu rer feeling of someth ing more” (PP, :288,

292).

In exploring this “more,” I hope

to

sh ow that the processive-relational or

field character OfJames’s “self’ becomes increasingly m o re cxpIicit an d cen-

tral. This is due in great part, I believe, to the fact thatJam es bec om es more

conscious

of

and co nfident about those m etaphysical presuppositions that

he derived from personal expe rience. Having flirted with the notion of an

egoless self and an epiphenomena1 consciousness,

in A

Pll4rulistic Universe he

spcaks in field langua ge, which

is

m uch more congenial to a “substantive”

view

of

the self and consciousness

that

is open

to

the possibility

of

personal

immortality.



I have already n oted that w he n selves are viewed as transactional centers

of activity-as fields-consciousncss is not m erely an ep iph en om en on , no r

is it imported from

some

transcmp irical realm

of

bcing. Consciousncss is

itself

a

field con tinuous with both conscio us and nonc onscio us fields, the

distinction bctwccn the conscious and nonconscious fields being determined

o n the basis o f range, complexity, and modes o f selectivity and initiation.

The task remains of phcnornenologicallydescribing h especific charac-

teristics

of

those fields designated “consc ious,” b ut the distinct adv antage o f

such a field approach

is

that there is n o need to go “outside” cxpcrience in

describing consciou sness in

order

to avoid

a

materialistic

o r

bchavioristic

reductionism.Thus, i n the final analysis, he copeandcomplexity of

hu m an consciousness can bc dete rm ined on ly experientially. H crc, howevcr,

a crucial dis t inct ion must be made:onc repeatedly refcrrcd to as the distinc-

tion between the descriptive or phenorncnological and the cxtrayolative or

speculative. It is the sam e distinc tion that is a t work , as we shall

see,

w hen

James distinguishes

what

is religiously

expeuietrced

fr o m overbeliefs concern-

ing this experience.

I

wish to utilize this descriptive-extrapolative distinction in considcring

the self as it em erges in James’s later w rit in g s. T hc first task will be to de-

scribe

as

faithfully as possiblewhat can bc immediatelycxyeriencedand

then to suggestplausibleextrapolations from his expericnc e. It m us t be

stressed a t the

outset,

how ever, that this is a functional distinction, the bor-

ders of wh ich arc shifting and can vary from time to time as well as f r om

person to person.

For

examp le, following James, I will contend hat he

reality of God is an cx trap olatio n.or overbelicf, b ut

a

mystic would makc a

s tr on g er ex periential ~ l a i r n . ~ T h e

cy

point here is that ifJames’s position is

legitimate, thc nccd for extrapolation o r ovcrbclicf may be d u c o n l y to an

accidental, non perm anen t imitation in hedevelopment

of

human con-

sciousness.

T h e

possibility that the mystics’ expcricntial claim is a delusion

cannot,

of

course, be definitely excluded. GivenJamcs’s experiential criteria,

then, nothing shor t of im m ed iate cxpcricnce o f the divine

would

bc

ade-

quate or com pletely satisfying. In the present stage of thc human condi t ion,

howevcr, the

most

that can bc clairncd philosoph ically is that such an experi-

ence is

a

possibility that no t on ly do cs no tonflict with reality as irnrnediate-

ly

experienced andmetaphysicallyarticulatedbutalso

is

consistent with

such

experience-indeed,

is

possibly an enrichment,

a

deepening and con-

tinuation of o ur narrow er quo tidian experiences.

While evcryone m ight ag ree that wh at is immediately experienced is be-

yond dispute, it is quite evid ent that jus t w ha t it is that is imm ediately expe-

rienced is a matter of great dispute. This is made obvious by the variety of

competing, inconsistent, and even contradictory claims of imm ediate expe-

rience. James and host o f twcn tieth-ccntury phen om enolog ists havc signif-

icantly decpencd our awareness of ho w dif ic ul t i t is to describe with com-

plete

fidelity thc charactcristics

of

expericnce.Therewould

be

no s uch

difficulty if imm ediate cxpe rience wc re lcar, distinct, a nd unam biguo us i n -



104 Personal Im m rt a l i t y : Possibility and Credibility

stead of being characterized by ob scuritie s, shades, ma rgins, fringes, pen-

umbras , and what James

has callcd

“the vague and inar t icu1ate””which

returns us to the ques t ion of the “m or e” that accompanies all experiences.

“All that

is,”

James tells

us,

“is

experiences, possible

or

actual. Immediate

experience ca rries a sense oftmre. . . . T h e ‘more’ develops, h arm oniou sly or

inharmoniously; and terminates in fulf il lment o r check.”

Hc

goes

on

to say

that “the pro blem is

to

describe the universe in these terms” (TC 11:381).

In his o w n effort

to

describe the universe n such terms, Jame s oves non-

systematically from the imm ediately eviden t “m ore” hat is present as “mar-

g in” or “ f r ing e”

to

such perceptua l fields as the visual and au dit ory ; to the

“m o re ” that is involved n epistemological-ontological questions such as

objective reference, kn ow ing

two

hings together , knowing other minds ; to

the “more” involved in metaphysical-religious questions such

as

the “wider

self” and overlapping consciousnesses, including divine and human. James’s

doctr ine

of

the “full self’ must include

all of

these “mores.”

I t

is obvious

that there is not an equal consensus regarding hese diverse “m ores”; that s

why James , or anyone at tempt ing to const ruct

a

doct r ine of the

self

along

Jamesian lines, m ust first establish the general character of this expe riential

“m ore” f rom experiences wh ere

the

evidence is mo st wide ly com pelling

before considering exp eriences

of

“more”

that are less universal a nd m or e

controversial. James’s central claim, and t he one crucial for the purposes of

this essay, is that the structure of o u r visual fields, for example, is in some

respects th e sam e as the structure of m ystical experience.

“ O u r f ie lds of experience,” according

to

James, “have no more defini te

boundaries than have o u r fields

of

view. B o th are fringed forever by

a

more

that continuou sly develop es, and that continuou sly supersede s them as life

proceeds” ( E R E , 35). Let us followJames

as

hedescribes hismarginal

“more”

that accompan ies o u r field

of

experience. Th is w ill serve as

the

para-

d igm to be em ployed later in his c onsideration o f mystical experience.

M y ta lk

is

merely a description of m y present f ie ld

of

expe rience. Tha t field is

anexperience o f physical hings mm ediatelypresent,

of

“more” physical

things “always there beyond” the margin, of m y personal self “there,” and of

thoughts and feelings belonging to the

self,

toge ther wi th “o ther” thoughts

and feel ings connected with

what

I call “y ou r” personal selves.

Of

these vari-

ous

item s s om e, as fully realized, are “su&cients”; others, the physical things

“bey ond ” and “you r” thou ghts, com e as insufic ients-they connect hern-

selves wi th the m argina l “m ore .” B ut

.

.

.

that marginal “more”

is

part

of

the

experience under description. No one can use i t mystically and say that

self-

transcendency

or

epistemological dualism is already involved in the descrip-

tion-that the “m or e” is

a

referencebeyond he

experiejtce.

T h e “ m o r e ” is

more than the vividIy presented

or felt; the “beyond ”

is

beyond the centre

of

the field.

TC,

I:371)

James’s

use

of

the term “mystically’*

in

this

text

might be misleading

if

taken as his own understanding of mystical experience. H e is here using it,



as it is often use d, to c onve y the introduction of a nonexperiential realm

of

being. He is opposed to this notion of “m ystic al” jus t as he is op posed

to

in t roducing

a

transcendental Ego or substantial Soul t o avoid accounting for

the experiences ju st described in behavioristic or epiphe nom enalist terms.

T h e “sense of more” that belongs to all the selfsexperiences is an indication

of relations with a wid er reality than is curre ntly in

focus.

It is the task of

metaphysics and religious philosophy, of course, to suggest jus t what the

scope and characterof this w ider reality is, and we shall later follow James s

he describes it in term s of wider fields of consciousness. The only point to

be made at this time is that James’s affirmation of

a

wider real i ty or wider

consciousness or w id er self does no t involve inferr ing o r postulat inga real-

i ty or realm of being hat

is

essentially, completely, and permanentlydiscon-

tinuous with the experiential.

T h e reality of “something more” in our immediate exper iences evidenc e

o f that co ntinu ity that characterizes the self. We have already no ted James’s

conten tion that the felt experience of one’s ow n con tinu ity is the most inti-

mate grasp

of

that c ontin uity that is characteristic of reality or the world.

Ag ain, this is a variation o n James’s processive o r temporalistic metap hysics.

Perry calls co nti nu ity ‘‘one

of

the ma ster keys to the understanding ofJames’

thought .

I t

is

the do m inan t feature o f his last metaphysics”

(TC,

:524).

This

is another instanceof a feature thatJa m es first delineates psychologically and

phenomenologicallyand atercomes to utilizemetaphysically. A meta-

physical ex pression of co ntinu ity is found in the first and third “field”

sup-

positions, which were presented arlier: “ 1) ‘Fields’ that ‘develop’ un de r the

categories of con tinuity with each other ,” an d “ 3)All the fields commonly

supposed are incomplete and point to complement beyond thei r own con-

tent. The final content . . * is that of a plurality of fields, more or less ejec-

tive

to

each

other, b ut stil l con tinu ou s in various ways”

(TC,

II:365).

A processive or “growing” world, l ikea processive

or

grow ing self, m ust

involvecontinuity.Thiscontinu ity, however, is neither heabstract con-

t inuum of mathematics nor the permanent, unchanging substantial pr inciple

of an earlier me taphysics. Dy nam ic continu ity involves an overlapping of

fields and an a pp rop riation or inh eritan ce

of

past fields b y present ones.6

This is not to suggest that everyth ing is continuous with or imm ediately

related to everything

else.

The rc are discontinuities as well as continuities,

and there are diverse m od es

of

both .

The

way in which

a

self

is

cont inuous

w ith its ow n experiences is n ot identical w ith the way in which it is continu-

o u s

w ith another’s experience^.^ T h e distinctive C ontinuity w hereby theself

app ropria tes t o itself its previous fields

of

experience

is

w ha t in part, at least,

constitutes the selfs individua lity. Bu t since there is no self-continuity that

does not simultane ously involve continuity with other fields (air

breathed,

objects kno wn , persons enco untered ), we have a world-of radically plural

individuals withou t atomistic or isolating individuation. T h e crucial aspect

of

this question

for

my purpo ses is whether there is

a

sense

in

w hich

the

divine

and

human consciousnesses can be co ntinu ou s.



106

Pennrlnl

Zmnrortality:

Pussibitity

m d Credibility

C O N S C I O U S N E S S

A S SELFCOMPOUNDING

In order to arr ive t somc unders tanding of how James ,n his latcr writi ng s,

saw the rclation between thc div ine an d hu m an fields of consciousness, we

m ust ollow him-however briefly and superficially-as heconsiders

a

questionwithwhich

he

hadwrestled for many years: thequestion of

whether “states of consciousness, so called, can separate and com bine them -

selves freely, and keep their own ident i ty unchanged

while

forming parts of

simultaneous ficlds of experiencc of wider scope”

( P U ,

83). In

The

Principles

ofPrychology,

he

had appa rently answ ercd in the negative whcn he rejected

the “ mind-s tuff ’ or “m ind-du s t” theory : that is, the theory that our higher

mental states are co m po sed of smaller states. James insisted there that each

psychic state was

a

unit-novci, un ique , and individual-and no t

a

collec-

tion of pr imordial a toms

of

sensation that remained unchanged in them-

selves wh ile entering into various comb inations. For example, according to

the “mind-stuff’ theory, the taste of Icmonade would

be

s imply the a tom-

istic sen sations of water , lemon, and sugar conjoined. According to James,

however, the taste of lemo nad e is new and uniquc, and does not contain the

atomistic sensationsof water, lemon, and sugar.In spite o fJame s’s statem ent

in his Presidential Ad dress to the Am erica n PsychologicalAssociation n

1894

that in the interest

of

ha rm on y he was giv ing up his principle that

mental s tates ca nn ot com po un d (EP,

SS),

i t would bc more accurate to say

that he came slowly to modify it .8

In T h e Prirzciples

of Psychology,

as previousIy noted,

James

was allegedly

adhering to

a

methodologicaldual ism.Hence, hough each thoug ht

or

mental s tate was unique,

wo

minds could know

a

co m m on object. In Essays

in

Radical-Ewpiricism, James laims

to

surrender the dualismbetween

thoughts m t d things, conten ding that reality is co m po sed of pure experi-

ences wh ich in them sclves are neither me ntal nor physical but can becom e

either, depen ding

o n

the context o r relational functions. For examp le, the

pu re experience “p en ” is in itself neither mental no r ph ysical, belongs to

neitheryourmindnorm ymind.But since t is the. “same’t pen that is

known and

is

wri t ten wi th , and the “same” pe n that

you

and I know, it

would appear that “an identical part can help to comritt.rte tw o fields.”

T h s

doctrine, of course, is in conflict with the position of

The

Principles

ufPsy-

cltology,

which denies that m en tal states can have “parts .”

I t

was B.

H.

Bode

a nd

Dickinson M iller w h o, according to Jam es,

picked

u p

the contradict ion,

and their object ions ledJameso

keep

notes-totaling several h un dr ed pages

over tw o and

a

half years, in which

he

continually s truggled with the

prob-

lems

involved,

In a

1905 note, he asks, “How-can

two

ields be

units

if

they

contain t h s c o r n o n

part?”

And he irnmedrately adds, “We m u s t overhaul

the

whole business

of

co nn ectio n, confluence and the like, and

do

it radi-

cally”

(TC,

W750). James ends these notes durin g his wri t in g of the Hibber t

Lectures, which

were delivered several months later

and

subsequent ly pub-

lished as A

Pluralistic

Universe.

It is in this w or k that Jame s advan ces his



Jarwes:

Full Se l f n t r d Wider Fields 107

radical overhaul

of

thecharacter

of

confluentconsciousnessand allied

questions.

This “radical overhaul”

was

actually a somewhat more consistent and ex-

plicit articulation

of

insights and conccrns that

had

been present in

some

form inJames’s earliest eflection s. “He was simplyreaffirming,”Bruce

Kuklick q uite correctly notes, “the primac y of the concrete and immediate

over the abstract and the de r i~e d” ~-a nd , w e m igh tadd, the pervasiveness

of processes and relations that an acute attention to the con crete bring s to

awareness. Recall that on e of the advantages of employing

a

field model

of

reality is that it enables us to

be

m o re faithful to the “concrete.”

It

is interest-

ing to no te that in his reflections o n the “Miller-Bode O bjec tion s,” James

wonders

whether he might not

be

guilty

of

that “sin

of

abstraction”

(TC,

11:759) with which he had so often charged others. In A

Pl~mdis t ic

Universe,

he comes

to

realize that “ t he di ac u l ty o feeing ho w states

of

consciousness

can compo und themselves . .

.

is the general conc eptualist difficulty of any

one thing being

the

same wi th many things , e i ther t once

o r

in

succession,

for the abstract concepts o f onen ess and rnanyness m us t needs exclude each

other”

( P U ,

127). This “conceptual is t d i f fmdty” s bound u p with the tradi-

tional “logic o f identity,” wh ich Jame s finally feels com pelled to g ive up

“fairly, squarely, and rrevocably”

( P U ,

96).j0

T he central charge against

this logic is that i t denies the continu ous universe, wh ich was a concern

of

James throughout his reflective life: “T ha t secret of a con tinuous l ife which

the universe know s b y heart andacts on every instant cannotbe

a

contradic-

tion incarnate. I f logic says it s one,

so

m uch the w or s e f o rogic” ( P U ,94).

EXPERIENCE OVERFLOWS CONCEPTS

A running theme in James’s thought, which reaches its crescendo in A Plu-

ruZistic

Utliverse,

is that various mo des

of

rationalism

or

intellectualism have

repeatedly endeavored to su bs tit ut e clear, distinct, and chang eless conc epts

for the rather murky, messy, and ever c han gin g experiences of on go ing life.

James, no ting that “framing abstract conce pts s on e of the ublimest

of

our

huma n prerogatives,”

g o e s on

to find it understandable that earlicr thinkers

have forgotten that “con cepts are only ma n-m ade extracts from the tern-

poral flux”;as

a

result, however, they ended up treating concepts “as

a

supe-

r ior type of being, bright, changeless, true, divine, and utterly opp osed in

nature to the turbid, restless low er w orld ”

(PU,

98-99).

When

we

concep-

tualize, w e cut out a section o f t he flux

of

experience and fix it in a static

form, thereby excluding everything else in experience b u t th at wh ich we

have fixed. In c on tras t, experiences in the real sensible flux of life ‘‘corn-

penetrate each other

s o that it

is

not easy to kno w jus t

what is

excluded and

what is no t” (PU,

13).

James maintains that intellectualism, after “destroy-

ing

the immediately given coherence of the phenomenal wor ld ,” inds itself

unable

to realize cohe rence hroug h ts conc eptual substitutes and hence

must

“resort

to

the absolute for

a

coherence

of

a

higher type.” May there



108 Personal Immortality: Possibility a n d Credibility

not, however, be present in the

flux of

sensible experience an overloo ked

rationality? Instead, then, of disintegrating co ncrete ex perience through in-

tellectualist criticism and substituting “the pseud o-rationality

of

the sup-

posed absolute point of view,” the real remed y is to focus more attentively

and intel l igently upon the imm ediate flow

of

experience ( P U , 38). O ur ex-

perience is too rich , too comp lex, too textured and many -sided to be ade-

quatelyrepre sen ted in abstractcategories.“Rea lity, ife,experience,con-

creteness, immediacy, use what word you will, exceeds our logic, overflows

and surrounds i t” ( P U ,

96).

Attent ion must be given here to an ambigui tyn this “immediate experi-

ence” to which Jamesso frequently refers and from wh ich

e

wishes to draw

so mu ch. Som e crucial implicat ions of this ambiguity w il l appear when w e

con sider James’s claim that

we

are “part and parcel of a w ider self.” Let m e

begin by suggest ing thatJames

came

to realize that no t ev eryth ing in imm e-

diate experience was “im mediate.”

I

th ink we m ust dis tinguish immed iate

or concrete exper ience f rom “pure immediacy.” Theatter wou ld refer only

to w hat is in conscious focus, including the conscious margins;

the

former

would include “vir tual it ies” and “other” elations that ma y be or ma y note

brought to consciousness

at

a later time. Sinc e these are con stituents of the

concrete experience, we m igh tsay that they are experienced subconsciously.

Several ofJam es’s late notes, com bined with his v iewsn

the sublim inal self

( to be treated

later),

support the dis t inct ion

here

suggested. O n November

26, 1905,James wonders whether he might be omitt ing somethingital in his

eKort “to run things by pure immediacy.”For the world to run as i t should,

“ a n other than the mmediate”seems to be required . He goe s on o ask

whether it would

be possible to “trea t this oth er as equiva lent to stsbtonsciour

dynam ic operat ions between the parts of experience, distinct from the con-

scious relations wh ich the po pu lar term ‘experience’ connotes’’ (TC,II:753).

So m e m on ths later (June

8,

1904),James writes:

The “cosmic omnibus”around about experience,

s

the “being”

of the

experi-

ences and what not

immediately

experienced relations they may stand in. All

these facts are uir~ually xperienceor mattersof later experience, however.

.

. .

Not all that

an

experience virtually “is” is content of its immediacy. .

.

. The

cosmic omnibus for any given experience would thus seem to be only other

correlated experiences.

TC,

II:758)*1

In exploring any ex perience, then, i t would seem that

we

are obliged to

range much more widely than the realm f “pure immediacy.” This is w h y

such exp loration is open-ended an d on going; why i t must involve hyp oth-

eses,

speculations, a nd extra pola tions if, parado xically,

we

are to move

more

deep ly into “ imm ediate experience.’’

These sam e characteristics of process and relation that I have repeatedly

stressed beco me more explicit as James realizes how much “s tat icahty” has

remained in his articulation of experience.

A s

late as September

of

1906, he



James:

Full

S e l f a d

W i d e r

Fields 109

asks: “May not m y whole t rouble be d uc to the fact that

I

an1 still treating

what is really a l iving dynam ic s i tuat ion

by

logical and statical categories?’

He

goes

on to say that he o ug ht to have the courag e to postulate activity, to

intro du ce agents-in sh or t,

to

“vivify h emechanism of change ’’ (TC,

II:760). Bu t mo re than

a

year later (Feb ruary 1908)he still wonders whether

part

of

the difficulty is du e to “a retention of staticality in thenot ion of ‘that’

and ‘is,’

”

Th is is the period, however, during w hich Jam cs is wri t ing w hat

will later be published as A P11mlistic

Universe,

and so he has seen the neces-

sity for surrende ring logic if w e are to cnter into the depth and thickness o f

living cxperience. He nowrealizes that the pro blem is to

state

w itho ut para-

dox the intuitive or Iive constitution

of

thc active life. This can

be

done

“only

by

approximation, awak ening sympathy with i t rather than assum ing

logically

to

define it; for logic makes all things static.” I t is the processivc-

pluralistic-relational character of the universe that James is now stressing:

“Be the universe as m u c h

of a

unit as you like, plurality has once

for

all

broken out within i t .” What the niverse e ectiuely manifcsts are “centres of

reference and action . . . an d these centres disperse each other’s rays.”

T h u s ,

James tells us, no l iving “it

is

a

stark nu m erica l un it. Th ey all radiate and

coruscate in man y directions; and the nanyness is du c to he plural ity round

them .” W hat all this adds u p

to

is

that “neither the world nor things are

finished, but i n process; and that

process

means more’s that are continu ous

yet novel. This last involves the whole paradox of an

i t

whose modes are

alternate and exclusive of each other, the sam e and not-sam e interpen etrat-

ing” (TC,

II:763-64). 2

CON

AND EX

When we com e to

focus

more direct ly o n self-compounding consciousness,

we shall see that this involves “the sam e and not-sam e interpenetrating.”

First, how ever, it is necessary

to

consider an ailied que stion , wh ich takcs the

form

of a

series of what might bcdesignated

con (LO)

nd

ex

problems-how

individual realities can be both with and wi thout each other . The mo st cru-

cial

of

these problems for m y purposes is how h u m a n

persons

can

be cot2

God an d’ .ex God; both cont inuous and discont inuous wi th God; both pre-

sent to and absent f rom God.

James’s approach, of course, is to give a hypothetical or speculative re-

sponse to this question after having shown the

cot1

and

ex

characteristics of

all concrete experiences. O n intellectualist grounds, he says, this

is

impossi-

ble: “ T h e intellectualist sta tem en t is that

esse

and

sentiri

are the same,

a

state

of m ind is wh at i t

is

realized as. I f M

is

realized as

con

a, then it i s con a, and to

be identical with its own self mu st always be con a; wha tever else it may

be

CON

w ith, it can never

be e x n .

That

M must

permanently carry

u along

w i th

it”

(TC,

II:763). B ut as we have already seen and will further see, “the im-

mediate experience o f life solves the problems which so baffle our concep-

tual intelligence”

( P U ,

116).

We

have also already seen

and

will

further

see



110

Persotial Immortality : Possibility and Credibil ity

that given the processive-relational or field character of experience, every

“bit of experience” is

cot1

and ex other bits. Further, since these fields are

continually shifting, gaining, and losing, other fields that were ex will be-

come

cot?

and vice versa.13

Using Bergsonian language, James describes this processive-relational

world as “an endosmosis or conflux of the same with the different: they

compenetrate and telescope” ( P U , 114). In such a telescopic and endosmotic

world “there is no reason why A might not be

co-

and ex-B, i.e., continuous

in any direction with something else.” This would be a universe in which

nothing “is absolutely cut off from anything else, and nothing is absolutely

sofidaire”

(TC,

II:762).l4 This is a dynamically continuous world rather than

one of discontinuous “plural solipsisms”

(

TC,

II:757). The experiences con-

stituting this world change in such fashion that there is a continuous overlap

of the earlier and the later. The view that emerges is never an absolutely

novel creation following a complete annihilation; rather, “there is partial

decay and partial growth, and all the while

a

nucleus of relative constancy

from which what decays drops off, and which takes into itself whatever is

grafted on, until at length something wholly different has taken place.” The

universe is continuous, then, without being one throughout. “Its members

interdigitate with their next neighbors in manifold directions, and there are

no clean cuts between them anywhere” ( P U , 115).15 While logical distinc-

tions are insulators, “in life distinct things can and do commune together

every moment”

( P U ,

116). The logically distinct experiences diffuse, and

connections are made; for this reason, reality cannot be penned in; “its

structure is to spread, and a$ect”

(TC,

II:762).

l7

Unlike our concepts, our

concrete pulses of experience are not pent in by definite limits. “You feel

none of them as inwardly simple, and no two as wholly without confluence

where they touch.” Interrelatedness, then, is essentially characteristic of all

realities. “The gist of the matter is always the same-something ever goes

indissolubly with something else. You cannot separate the same from its

other, except by abandoning the real altogether and taking to the conceptual

system” (PU, 127, 128).

In the light of all this, James contends that the old objection against the

self-compounding of states of consciousness-that it was impossible for

purely logical reasons- “is unfounded in principle.” I think that James

might have more accurately said, “unfounded in fact or concrete experi-

ence,” for he never does explain, nor does he claim to, how states of con-

sciousness can be compounded.

As

early as 1895, to the question as to

whether we can account for complex facts “being-known-together,” he

responded: “The general nature of it we can probably never account for, or

tell how such a unity in rnanyness can be, for it seems to be the ultimate

essence of experience, and anything less than it apparently cannot be at all”

(EP, 78).18 If we cannot explain, at least by means of concepts, the unity in

diversity that characterizes all experiences, we can point and describe, how-



James: Full S e l f a d W id er Fields

111

ever inadequately. Again the distinction of James lies in his having brought

so brilliantly to our awareness the details of the flux of experience. When we

focus on the concrete, we become aware of the overlapping complex of

fields peculiar to the tiniest bit of experience as well as to the largest. “Every

smallest state of consciousness, concretely taken, overflows its own defini-

tion. Only concepts are self-identical; only ‘reason’ deals with closed equa-

tions; nature is but a name for excess; every point in her opens out and runs

into the more” ( P U , 129).19 As for mental facts compounding themselves,

James maintains that in spite of what he said in his Principles OfPsychology,

they “can

.

. . if you take them concretely and livingly, as possessed of vari-

ous

functions. They can count variously, figure in different constellations,

without ceasing to be ‘themselves’

”

(TC,

II:765).

It is clear that if we are to speak of the self as the “passing Thought,” as

James did earlier, we must understand this “passing Thought” in terms of

James’s later metaphysics of experience. By doing so, we are presented with

a self immeasurably richer than an epiphenomenalist or behavioristic self.

The self is always the self of the “passing moment,” but we have seen that

every passing moment radiates outward and consists of numerous and di-

verse overlapping fields, many if not most of which are not in conscious

focus. “There are countless

co’s

that are immediately undiscerned as such,

unanalyzed.” These include the continual co of our organic sensations, the

sense of the immediate past, of outlying space, of the background of in-

terest, and the like: “All these are so ready to be distinctively experienced,

that we deem them experienced strbconsciotrsly all the while.” James then asks

us to “suppose that total conflux, possible or actual, is really the ‘bottom’

fact, suppose it actual ‘subconsciously,’-then the problem is that of the

conditions of insulation” (TC,

II:757). This, as James notes, is the problem

of his 1897 Ingersoll lecture, published as Human Immortality-the problem

of individual human consciousnesses being immersed in a wider con-

sciousness of which they are only sporadically aware.

Before turning to that problem, we can conclude this section by present-

ing again that text which, along with another cited earlier,20 constitutes

perhaps the most succinct and significant statement by James as to the char-

acter of the self. This text can serve as a summation of what has just pre-

ceded, and as an anticipation and experiential ground for the more spec-

ulative and extrapolative considerations to follow.

M y present field of consciousness is a centre surrounded by

a

fringe that

shades insensibly into a subconscious m ore.

I

use three separate term s here to

describe this fact; bu t I m ig ht as well use three-hund red, fo r the fact is all

shades and n o boundaries. Which part of it proper ly is in m y consciousness,

which ou t? If

I

nam e what is out, it already has com e in. T he centre wo rks in

one way while the margins work in another, and presently overpower the

centre and are central themselves. What we conceptually identify ourselves

w ith and say we are thinking

of

at any time is the centre; but o u r j il l self is the



112 Personal Inlrnortnlity:

Possibility

ntrd

Credibility

w ho le field, w ith all those indefinitely radiating subconscious possibilities of

increase that we can onl y

feel

without conceiving, and can hardly begin t o

analyze. T h e collective and disruptive w ays

f being

coexist here,

for

each part

functions distinctly, makes connexion w ith its ow n peculiar region

in

the still

wider rest ofexpcrience nd tends to dra w us into that l ine, and yet

the

whole

is

sornchow felt

as

o n e pulse of o u r life,-not conceived so, but

felt

s o .

( P U , 130)

WI DER C ONS C I OUS NES S

Th e gro un d w e ave jus t covered, w hich led

us

toJames’s description

of

the

“full

self,”

can profitably be explored-or reexplored-by focusing ou r

at-

tention m or e directly o n th e reality,

or

a t least the possibility, o f a wider

consciousness with wh ich individual hum an onsciousnesses are in ouch by

way o f their subconscious o r subliminal selves.

As

Perry has no ted, “T he

idea o f consciousness ‘beyond thc margin’ o r ‘below the threshold’ was a

metaphysical h yp oth es is of the first impo rtance. This hypo thesis afforded

an experimental approach to religion, and constituted the only ho peful

pos-

sibility

of

givin g scientif ic su pp or t

to

supernaturalistic faith” (TC,

11:160).

In

a letter

to

Bergson, James himself expressedhe v iew “ tha t

he

inchpensable

hypothesis in a philosophy of pure experience is that of many

kinds of

other

experience than ours, that the question

of

[ ~ ~ : ~

its conditions,

etc.) becomes a m ost urgent quest ion” (TC, IJ:610).

Tentatively, we might distinguish

four

groups of exp eriential data or ex-

periential claims, varying in deg rees of imm ediacy and acceptance, which

are involved in the extrapolation

of

a wid er self or w iderconsciousness. The

first group would be made up of those fields of cxperiencc that include but

are no t restricted to th e fields

of

our special scnses (auditory, visual, tactile).

These w ere descr ibed in the previous sect ion, and I stressed their con stitu-

tion

as

processes an d relations having centers and m arg ins

or

fringes in

a

continually shifting relationship. They,

of

course, have the highest

degree of

immediacy and acceptability. The second group would consist o f the

sub-

conscious

or

unconscious evidenced in psychotherapeutic situations and ar-

ticulated in psychological theories. He re the imm ediacy w ould be less com -

pelling, but the successful results, real o r believed, co nse que nt upo n pres up-

posing

uncon scious factors have led to a fairly widesp read acceptab ility.21

The th i rd group would include

all

those experiential claims

o r

phenomena

that

are

referred to as psychical or parapsychological.Jam es, as is well

known,

was

most interested in and sympathet ic tohese experiential claims;

for m an y years

he

suppor ted and

to

a limited degree participated in psychi-

cal research.Nevertheless, one year beforehisdeath,afternoting n he

“Final Impressions o f a Psychical Researcher” thathe had been in touch with

psychicaI resea rch literature for twe nty-fiv e years, he confessed: “Yet

I

am

theoretically no ‘further’ than

I

was at the beginn ing”

( M S ,

175).22

I

a m g o i n g t oabel the four th group ofxperiences involved in the extrap-

olation

of

a

wider

self

“mystical expcricnces.” These are the

most

impor tan t



James:

F d l

Se l fn t rd

Wider Fields

113

experiences

or

experiential claims fo r m y

purposes,

and I am deliberately

distinguishing them m ore sharply f rom parapsychological claims than did

James. He tended touse the term “myst ical” more widelyhat I will do, but

the

difference

is

more

functional or methodological hansubstantive.

I

wo uld adm it that ifthe p arapsyc holog ical claims are authen tic, then they arc

evidence o f that wi de r consciousness manifest in mystical experiences if

they

are

authen tic. M y justification for this distinction is James’s o w n prag ma tic

one-the “fruits” that have apparently been fo rth co m in g in

one

case and

absent in theo the r . Thos e w hom w esually thin k ofa sgreat mystics appear

to have brou ght for th bothn their ow n lives and in those touche d y t h e m a

deep ening, an illumination and enrichm ent. Suc h fruits are dccidedly less

evident in the lives

of

tho se usually classed

as

“psychics” or “spiritualists.”

James himself ather eluctantly nd adly onclud ed hat “ th e spirit-

hypo thesis exhibits a vacancy, triviality and incohe rence of m in d painful to

think

of

as the state o f the depa rted” (CER,

438-39).23

I am not sugges t ing ,

nor didJam es, that my stical experiences could be employed to “pro ve” th e

exis tence of Go d or the imm ortal i tyf th e self. Following James,

however,

I

am maintaining hatmysticalexperiencesare he trongestexperiential

grounds upon which we can

base

any ex trapolation concerning a m ore en-

compassing reality.

James w as desirous of br inging for th a hypothesis that would cover the

phenomena in

all of

the gro up s have rou gh ly delineated. It was his hy po th-

esis, variously

expressed, of the “wider self” that he believed did so most

successfully-although even in

The

Kwiet ies qf Religious Experience and A

Pluralistic Universe, we are given t most a sketch and suggestive hypothesis.

Before considering these works, let s lo ok briefly at

some

o f the other exts

in w hich James expresses his views concerning a “wider consciousness.”

To

begin

with ,

1

would l ike

to note

that

James’s

position

on

this matter

cannot be separated from his long-standing religious belief

to

t he effect tha t

we are engaged in a process not adequately accounted for in traditional

re-

strictive ma terialistic or naturalistic terms. In one of

his

talks to teachers,

James stated:

“No

on e believes mo re s trongly than d o that w ha t ou r senses

kn ow as ‘ this wo rld’ is only one por t ion of our mind’s total en viro nm ent

and object.”24 And several years earlier, in

“Is

Life W orth Living? ” (1895),

he hadexpressed th e view hat“whatever else be certa in, his at least is

certain,-that the w or ld

of

our

present natural knowledge

s

enveloped

in

a

larger world of m m e sort: of w hos e residual properties we at present can

frame no positive idea” ( W B , 50). B ut even years before these texts were

w ritten, James’s gene ral cou rse w as se t, for w hateve r the impo rtant an dpe-

cific differences he hadwi th his father,

he

never wavered in his belief tha t the

world of his father’s religious conce rns was the deeper w orl d. James’s

“sci-

entific”

bent,

co m bin ed w ith his religious sensibility, gave rise to wh at a t

times appears to

be

almost a schizophrenia.

But

he never accepted the con-

flicts between religion and science

as

permanent

and

irresolvable.



114 Persorrol Itnmortnlity: Possibility m d Credibility

James’s

continuing concern was to

show

that one could acknowlcdge the

achievements o f science with ou t

surrcndering a

religious belief in realities

anddimensions of h u m a ncx perk nc e that m ust ever eludc sciencc. Al-

though

he

never system atically reco nciled his scientific and religious

pro-

clivities and

a t times

seemed to assume irreconcilable positions, I believe

that as h is m etaphysics slowly took form, a

more

harmonious relation be-

tween science and religion w.as incre asin gly sug ges ted. T his d irection is in-

dicated in

Perry’s

text cited above, b ut no te that he

saysJarncs’s

metaphysics

offers

the “possibility

of

giving scientific

support to

supernaturalistic faith”

(TC, I:

3

60;

emphasis added) not cient i f ic yvooJ

Both

in

our

m oral l ife and

in ou r relig iou s ife-indeed, even

to

a degrec in ourcientific life-Jamcs in-

sisted upon the necessity

of

beliefs o r faith com m itm ents ,

to

whatever

ex-

tent such acts might be reinforced

by

rational

or

scientific investigations.

EXCURSUS:

FREEDOM AS POSTULATE AND

METAPHYSICAL PRINCIPLE

A brief

look

at the phe nom enon of “f rcedo m ” wil1 serve

to

illustrate how

James’s later metaphysics came to lend su pp or t to,

b u t

no t prove, his long-

stand ing b eliefs. In an o ft-cited text

from

his 1870diary,

in

descr ibing how

he

pulled back from the br ink

of

self-destruction, he stated: “ M y first act

of

free will shall be

to

believe

in free

will”

(LWJ, I:l47). 25 Fourteen years

later,

in

“The D i l em m a o f D e t e r m i n i sm , ”ames expressed this sam e point:

“Our

first act of freedom, if

we

are f ree, ou gh t in all inwa rd propriety to

be

to

a f h m that we a re frec” (

W B , 115).

Again, in

The Principles ofl)rychology, we

are told that “freedom’s first deed sh ou ld be to affirm itself.” At this tim e,

James

has

not yet broke n f ree of dual i sm ,

t

least as

a

methodological postu-

late, and thus hc can only juxtapose “the great scientific postulate that thc

world

must

be

on e unb rok en fact” alongside “a

rnorul

postulate about the

Universe,

the postulate that what ought t o be can 6e” (PP,

II:1177).

James begins, then , w ith freed om as a m oral po stulate or an act

of

faith,

and there is a sense in which i t remains s o to the end. Any alleged proof or

rational dem ons tration w ou ld be inimical

to

the radical character

of

free-

dom.

Ifwe are rationally coerced

to

afflrm freedom , then we are deprived of

a significant dimen sion of freedom-the freedom

to

af ir rn f ree do m . Yet

w hileJ am es never denies a faith dim ens ion to human

freedom,

it becomes

less

and

less

a

“blin d” faith

as

he g rows

rnorc

confident

of

his metaphysics.

W hat began

as

a desperate act o f faith and a moral postulatc is gradualIy

transformed bybeingorganical ly ncorporatedwithin a metaphysics.

A

pluralistic-processive-relational

wor ld ,

an

“open” nd unfinished

uni-

verse”

characterized

by

chance an d novelty, is one that

does

not reduce

free-

dom to a subjectivistic o r psycho logical juxtaposition at best a n d

an

aberra-

tion at

worst. As noted earlier,

the

particular kind

of

world affirmed

by

James

is

one

in which there are “or iginal comm encemen ts o f series of phe-

nomena ,

whose

re ah at io n exciudes oth er ser ies which were previously

pos-



siblc”

( C E R ,

31).2h In one of his last w rit ings , Jam es insists that the dif-

ference betwecn mo nism and pluralism rests on the reality o r unreality of

novelty. He goes on to say that “the doctr ine of free will” is “that we our-

selves may

be

authors

of

genuine novelty” ( S P P ,

75).

James no lon gc r posits du alism , even m ethodologically, for he

n o

longcr

thinks in ter m s

of

an “objective” determ ined wo rld that is the conc ern of

science and

a

“subject ive” undetermined world that gro und s mo rali ty and

religion. T he re is

one

w orl d, he says, however pluralistic and diverse it may

be; and chance , novelty, and self-origination in somc sense characterize this

world in a11 i ts dimensions. A rnctaphysics of experience that overcomes

ontological dualism is, of course,

a

crucial and indispensable factor in an y

effort

to

br ing

about

greater harm ony betw een scicnceandreligion. An

experience which,

in

its m ost irnm cdia te and tinicst bits, involves dimen-

sions that escape a mechanistic-materialistic reductionism is op en to beliefs

in realities “ thi ck er” an d m ore extensive than those portrayed by the

cus-

tomary category

of

“sense-data.” These realities, while not encompassed or

exhausted by thc mo re im m ed iate and sensible experience

of

the moment ,

are nevertheless viewed as cont inuous wi th

these

m om en tary experienccs,

thereby obviating the necessity to posit a radically discontinuou s “othc r”

or

“spir itual” world b eyond “this world.”

WIDER CONSCIOUSNESS:

DIVERSE

MANIFESTATIONS

A s

with “freedom ,” Jam es was aware of and affirmed

a

m o d e of “wider

consciousness” so m e years befo rc his metaphysics crystallized suficicntly to

account

for

i t rathcr than sim ply juxta po se i t

to

the physical w or ld.

I n

his

early psychical research

as

well as in Ellitnut1 Imrrmrtulity, dualism is still pre-

supposed.

in The Vuvieties

ofReligiour Expeuieme,

it is implicitly overcome; in

Essays

in

Radical

Etnpiuicism,

A

Pllrrulistic

Utliverse,

and

S o r w

Probletm

of

Phi-

losophy,

it is formally and ex plicitly rejected. By considering how James

viewed an d em ployed this “wid er consc iousness,” we can best understand

its natu re and im porta nce s well as its utility fora

belief in personal immor-

tality.

Lct us begin with the role assigned a “larger consciousness’’ in James’s

Hrsn1nt7 I ~ n m o r t d i t y ,n which he responds to tw o objcctions against pcrsonal

immortality. The second objection, wh ich is of secondary importance for

the

question

of

a

“wid er consc iousness,” migh t be Iabcled the “logistical

objection"-how could God pos sibly ma intain in existence the billions of

people

who

have

existed

and w h o will

come

to exist? James’s respo nse, in

brief, is that we can no t judg c Go d’s capacity in ter m s of o u r finite limita-

tions: “G o d, w e can say, has

so

inexhaustible a capacity for love that

his

call

and need is

for

a literally endless accumulation

of

created lives”

( H I , 42).

T h e first objection, and the onc directly relevant to ou r present concern,

is that if

“tlzotrght

is a juzct ion o the braitz,” consciousncss cannot survive the

brain’s dissolution. James acc epts

the

postulate

of

thoug ht as

a

function

of



116

Persoad Itnmortnlity: Possibility and Credibility

the brain, buth e suggests that there are w o diEerent kinds of function, both

of wh ich are possible b ut on ly one of which excludes personal immortality.

First, there is the “prod uctive function,” wh ereby the brain w ou ld prod uc e

consciousness

as the

electric cur rent prod uce s lig ht or the eakettle

produces

steam.

I f

this is the function of the brain, then of course consciousness can

have no reality a part from

thc brain. But there is another possibility: name-

ly, the “transmissive function” by which the rain serves mercly to transmit

consciousness whose source is located outside the brain, as

a

stained-glass

window ransmits ight ( H I , 10-14). Obviously, if consciousness is only

transmitted rather than produced by the brain, thcre

s

no necessity

for

con-

sciousness to cease to exist when thc b rain

does.

“The s phe r e of being that

supplied the consciousness

would

still

be

intact;

and

in that m ore real wo rld

with which, even whils t here, i t was continuous, the consciousness m igh t ,

in ways u n k n o w n to us, continu e still” ( H I , 18).

According to

James,

both production and transmission arc hypotheses

polemically on a par, for “ in strict science, we can on ly w rite do wn thebare

fact

of

concomitance.” But considered in a widcr way, the transmission the-

ory has “positive sup eriorities.”

To

begin with, i t

is

not necessary to gener-

ate consciousn ess anew in a vast

nurnbcr of

places; “it exists already, behind

the scenes, coeval with thc w orld .” F urth er th ere is w ho le class of experi-

ences better accounted for by the transmission theory:

“such

phenomena ,

namely, as religious conve rsions, providen tial leadings in answer to prayer,

instantaneous healings, prem onit ions, appari t ions

a t

the time of de ath, lair-

voyant vis ions or impre ssions, and the w hole rang e of me dium ist iccapaci-

ties.” T he pro du ctio n the ory has

a

hard imeexplaininghowsuch

phe-

nomena can be p roduced by our sense organs, whereas for the transmission

theory, “they don’t have to

be

‘produced.’

”

Instead, “they exist ready-made

in the transcen dental world, and all that is needed is an abno rma l lowe ring

of the brain-threshold to let the m thro ug h” ( H I , 20-27).

In describing our relation to this larger consciousn ess, James speaks

of

“the con t inui ty

of

our consciousness with

a

mother-sea’’ ( H I ,

27).

in his

preface to the second edition o f the book,

ames

notes that this led

some

critics

to

accuse him of allowing only for the continu ed existence of the

larger consciou sness, o u r finite persons hav ing expired w ith the brain. In

reply, he maintained that the transmission theory allows one to “conceive the

mental

world betzirrd

the

veil

in

as

irdividualistic

a

form

ns

one

pleases .”

I f

one

takes theextreme ndividua listic view, the n one’s “finitemundanecon-

sciousness would be a n abstractfrom

one’s

larger, tru er personality, he

latter having even now some sor t of reality behind the scenes” ( H I , vi-vii).

In

spite o f James’s explicit su pp ort of the possibility of personal immor-

tality in this essay, I think this supp ort sho uld be received w ith some cau-

tion. It is true, as Perry noted, that “the transmission theory was clearly an

anticipation of the hypothesis developed in his later metaphysics and philos-

o p h y

of

religion, in wh ich the my stical and similar experiences w ere

in-



J m e s : F d l

S e l f a d Wider Fields

117

terpreted a s an overflow of superhuman mental i ty through

a

lowering of the

normal threshold” ( X , [1:133).Nevcrtheless, much in this theory

as

it is

presented in Hzrlnarz

lrnnwrtality is

in conflict w ith wh at I believe arc

the

richer and m ore fruitful features ofJarnes’s me taphysics.

I t

is

clear, for ex-

am ple, that James places his theory against the back groun d o f a dualistic

reality, as is evidenced in his asking us to

“suppose

. . . that the w h ol e uni-

verse of material things-the fur nitu re of earth and choir ofheaven-should

turn o u t to be

a

m ere surface-vei1 o f phenomena, hiding and keeping back

the world of gen uine realities” ( H I ,

IS). This

sound s frightfully close

to

that

rationalistic world with which thc experiential

James

never ceased to strug-

gle. Further,

it

is a w orl d essentially static and peopled by hu m an bein gs

w ho are passivc transm itters

of

a

higher reality. This

would

seem

to

hold

wh ether that “higher real ity” s und crstood in

a

pantheistic or individualistic

sense. In the latter casc, persons would be reduced to instrum ents g athering

experiences

and

me mo ries for som e “larger, truer person ality” wh ose real

wo rld is elsewhere. Absent in all o f this are those real con tinuities and real

individual agents thatJames a t his best did

so

much to i l luminate. W hether t

is possible to extrapolate a plausible mode of personal immortal i ty depends

on

whether an experiential self fashionedalo ng Jamesian lines can

affirm

the

richness and significance

of

our

personal lives “here and now” while

re-

maining open to a co ntinu ing existence.

I

would

like

to

consider next an essay w ritten some six months before

James died-“A Sug gestion abou t Mysticism” (EP, 157-65).

Based

on sev-

eral experiences that took place after

1905,

this essay presents, perhap s in i ts

sharpest form, both the experiential

a n d

ambiguous character of this wider

consciousness w ith wh ich Jam es had been concerncd

for

s o

many years.”

In each of threc experiences, James tells

us,

there was a very sudden and

incomprehensible enlargement

of

the

conscious

field, accompanied b y

“a

curious

sense of cogni t ion

of

real fact.”

Each

experience lasted

Icss

than

two

minutes, and in each instance it “brok e in abru ptly up on

a

perfectly corn-

monplace situation.”

What happened each t ime was that I seemed

all

at onc e tobe reminded

of

past

experience; and this reminiscence,

ere

1 could conceive or n a m e i t distinctly,

developed intosom ething urther hatbe longedwith t , his

in

tu rn n to

som ething further stil l, and so on, until he process faded out, eaving me

amazed

at

the sudden vision

of

increasing ranges

of

distant

fact

of wh ich

I

could give n o articulate account. T h e mode of consciousness was perceptual,

not conceptual-the

field

expanding so fast hat here seemed no t ime for

conception or identification to get in itswork. .

.

T h e feeling-I wo n’t call it

belief-that I had had a sudden

opening,

had seen th rough a window, as it

were, distant realities that incomprehensibly belonged with

m y own

life, was

so

acute that

I

cannot shake it

off

to-day. (EP , 159-60)

W hat suggest ion or hypothesis doesJames offer to account for these and

other “m ystical” experiences?

To

gr asp his hypo thesis, it is first necessary

to



describe what he m ean s

b y

“field of conscioctsncss” as wcll as thc “thresh-

old” metaphor he

employs .

The

field

is compos cd

a t

all

t imes

of

a

mass

of

present sensation, in

a

cloud

of

me m ories, em otions , conc epts, etc. Yet these ingredients, which have to be

named

separately, arc not scparate, as the cons cious field contain s them .

Its

form is that of a much -at-once, in the unity

of

which the sensations,

memo-

ries, concepts, impulses etc., coalesce and are dissolved.

The

present field

as

a

whole came con t inuously ou t

of

its predecessor and w ill melt into its suc-

cessor continuously again, one sensation-mass passing into another sensation-

mass giving the character of a gradually changing present to the experience,

while thc memories and concepts carry t ime-coefic ients whichlace whatever

is

present in

a

temporal perspect ive more

o r

less vast.

(EP ,

158)

Now

it is impor tant , hcrc ,

to

distinguish the succeeding masses of scnsa-

tion f rom the m cm ories, con cepts, and conational states that also enter into

the “field

of

consciousness.” Wc do not

know

how fa r we arc “marginal ly”

conscious of

thesc

latterconstituents; in

a n y

event here is

n o

definite

boundary “betwcen what is central and what is marginal in C O ~ S C ~ ~ U S ~ C

nor does the margin itself have a definite boun dary. Let us imagine thc field

o f consciousncss in the fo rm o f

a

wavc or inverted

“U”

with

a

horizontal

line dcsignatcd

the

“threshold” running through

it. T h e

closed end of the

wave above thc threshold is “ordinary consciousness,” and the open-endcd

segment below the threshold is marginal

or

transmarginal consciousness or

subconsciousness. Just as

the

sl ightest movem ent of the cye will bring into

the

field

of

vision objects that had always

been

there,

so,

James hypothe-

sizes,

a

nlovenlcnt

of

the threshold downwards will similarly

bring

a mass

of sub-

conscious nlernorics, conccptions, emotional feelings, and perceptions

f

rela-

t ion, e tc . , into vicwall a t once; and

. .

. if this enlargcment of the ninlbus that

surrounds the sensational present is vast cnough, while no onc of the i tems

i t

contains attracts our attention singly , w c shall have the con ditio ns fulfilled

for

a kind of consciousness in al l cssentiai respects like that termed mystical.

I t

will be transient, if the changeof the thresh old s transient. I t will be of reality,

enlargemen t, and il lumination, possibly rapturously so. I t will be of unifica-

tion, for the present coalesces in it with ranges of the remote quite out of i ts

reach under ordinary c ircumstances; and the sense of relafiorr will bc greatly

enhanced.

( E P , 159)

James concludes

by

noting, as he did in describing his own experiences, that

the form is intui tive o r pe rceptual , not conceptual . All of this leads to

the

“suggestion

. .

that states

of

mystical intuition may

be

only very sudden

and

great

extensions

of

the ordinary ‘field of

consciousness.’ ”

This is, o f course, a mo st anlbiguous suggcs t ion

as

r e g a r d s the “wider

consciousness,” w hic h is apparcn tly realizcd in mystical cxpericnccs.

D.

C.

Mathur, concerned

to

stress the “naturalistic” currents in James’s tho ug h t,

interprets i t as appa rently “giving

a

‘naturalistic’ description of ‘mystical



Jmres: F d l S e l f

nrrd

Wider Fields 119

states.’ ”zx I believe th is is a possiblc interpretation which is no t as a t variance

w ith James’s treatme nt of my stical states in The Vnrielies

ofRelkiorrr

Experi-

ctzce as M athur sug gests it is. Even in those texts in which James is drawing

o u t “religious” o r “supcr-naturalistic” possibilities, he never

denies

that the

phen om ena, as such , cann ot “prov e” the reali ty

of

any consciousness bc-

yond the human.

As

we shall scc, the af irrn atio n

of

such rcality o r realitics

is an extrapolation

or

overbelief, which m u s t involve not only the bare

phc-

rnorncna of “mystical states” but a lso othcr human

rlecds

and experienccs.

T h e Vnrieties

was

w rit ten so m e years beforeJames undcrwent the cxperi-

ences just dc scrib cd . Th us, wh ik this wor k is a trcasurc trove o f descrip-

tions of personalxpericnces,hcyre, withneotable pre-

sented by James seco nd han d;

from

thc enjoy me nt o f mystical experienccs,

he tells

us,

he was alm ost entire ly excluded by his

own

constitution.-30B u t it

is the mass and universality o f experiences variously called religious, my-

stical, psychical, or hallucinatory that irnprcsscd Jam es and that he chided

science for igno ring .”’ Thc

bulk

of the Varieties consists

of

descriptions of

experiences that James feels have n o t been adeq uately accou ntcd for

in

thc

usual scientific languagc. Ha ving pres ente d thcse experienccs, he atte m pts

to distiil from them shared characteristics and thcn suggest h a w thcy m ig ht

bc accounted for in bo th psy cho log ical

a n d

religious terms, wh ich, while

distinct, are not ncccssarily o pp ose d.

There is a plethora of h um an experiences-philosophical, religious, psy-

chological-that testify, correc tly or incorrectly, to the “reality of the un-

seen."

The ir range and mu ltiplicity lead James to sugg cst that “it isas if

there were in the hum an consciousness

a

setlrc ofrenlity, afeelirrg af‘obective

yrese tm, LJ perception of what we may call

‘ m d z i y g

thew, ’ marc deep and

m or e general than any of the spccial a n d particular ‘senses’ by wh ich the

currentpsychologysupposesexiste nt realities to bcoriginally evealed”

( V R E ,

55). j2

For m a n y

of

thosc in th c rcligious sph ere, the objec ts

of

their

belief are presented

to

them “in the form

of

quasi-sensible realities directly

apprehended.”

For those

who

have thcm , suc h cxpcriences are as con vin cing

“as

any direc t sensible cxpcriences can

be”

and usually “much

more

con-

vincing than thc

rcsults

cstablishcd by m erc logic ever are” (I’RE,

59, 66).

In

his phenorncnological consideration of “convcrs ion,” James describes

i t as involving “forces seem ingly outside of thc conscious individua l that

bring redemption

to

his lifc.” Psych ology an d rcligion are in agrcc m cn t on

the reality of such forccs wh ile disag reein g as to their ultimate locus. For

psychology they are “subconscious” and d o n o t “transcen d the individual’s

perso nality” ; rcligion , at least Christianity, “insists that

they are

direct su-

pernatural opcrations

of

the Deity”

(VRE,

174). James will eventually en-

deavor to incorpo rate b oth thesc perspectives, and the m ediu m b y wh ich he

will do so is the

self

regarded as a “ficld of consciousness.” A gain, James

describes how o u r

mental fields continually succeed each oth er an d

how

their centers and m arg ins are ever shifting. Further, “som e fields are narrow

fields and

some

are w ide fields.” Wc rejoice wh en ou r ields o f consciou sness



arc widc,

for

“w e then see masses of truth togethcr, and o ften get glimpse s

of relat ions which we d ivine rather than see.” O n the other han d,

when

we

are drowsy o r ill or fat igued “o ur f ields ma y narrow almo st to a point”

James maintains that “the most important fact wh ich this ‘field’ for m ula

com me mo rates is the indetermination of the ma rgin.” Since “ord inar y psy-

chology’’ is no t able adequately to account for this margin, James holds hat

the discovery, “first mad e in 1886,”of the subconscious (or the subliminal

self) is the mo st imp ortant s tep forwa rd in psych ologyince he bega n study-

ing it. The claimmade, nitiallybyFrederickM yers, is that,“incertain

subjects at least, the re is not on ly the consc iou sne ss of

thc ord ina ry field,

with its usual centre and m arg in, bu t n addition thereto in the shape

f

a

set

o f mem ories, thoug hts, and feelings which arc extra-marginal and outside

of the primary consciousness al together, but yet m ust be classed as con-

scious facts of so m e so rt, able t o reveal theirpresencebyunmistakable

signs”

( V R E ,

190).33

A

self so consti tutcd, of course, is subject to incursions

f rom what m ight be called an un kn ow n, open-endedsource.W hile his

source may be them o re hidden aspects of one’s ow n personality, i t may also

be a reality actively present to the indiv idu al ield but hav ing a life extend ing

far beyond it.34 T ha t

is

a

ques t ion which,

as

already noted, cannot be set-

tled-if it can be “settled” a t all-solely on the basis of the reality of

a

subco nscious o r subliminal self. In

a

note, Jamesstates: “ I t is thus ‘scientific’

to interpret all otherw ise unac coun table invasive alterations of conscious-

ness as results of the tensio n o f sublim inal m em ories eaching the bu rsting-

point. Bu t can do r ob liges m e to onfess that there are occasional bursts in to

consciousness of results of w hic h i t is n ot easy t o d ernonstratc any pro-

longed subconscious incubation” (

V R E ,

19211.).

T h r o u g h o u t t h e

Varieties,

James wishes

to

describe the self in suc h fashion

as n ot to foreclose its co nti nu ity w ith a “ hig he r reality,” yet

at

the same t ime

no t to confuse a possibility with a certainty. Ju st as in

Humnn

Immortality he

endeavored to show that viewing thought as a function of the brain did not

exclude the possibility of person al imm ortality, so here he insists that th e

reference

of a

phenom enon to

a

subliminal self does not altogether “exclud e

the notion

of

the direct presence of the De ity”: “It is logically conceivable

that i f there

be

higher spiritual agenc ies that can directly touch us, the psy-

chological condition o f their do in g

so

might

be

our possession

of a

sub-

conscious region wh ich alone should yield access to th em . . .

.

If there

be

higher powers able o im pre ssus, they may get access to us only th rough the

subliminal door” (V R E , 197-98). 35

If the reality of the subco nscious or sublim inal elf does not foreclose the

possibility of a divine reality, neither does the existence of mystical states

guaran tee su ch reality. “T h e fact is that the m ystica l feeling of enlargement ,

union, and emancipation has n o specific intellectual con tent w hatever

of

its

own.” While

such

s ta tes wield no autho r i ty “d ue s imp ly to thei r b eing m ys-

(VRE,

388-89).



Jntnes:

Frrll

Selfntrd Wider

Fields 121

tical states,” they d o overthrow “the pretension of non-mystical states

to

be

the sole and ultimate dictatorsf what we may elieve.” Th at is w h y “i t mu st

always rema in an open question wh ether my stical states may no t possibly

be

.

.

.

super ior points of iew, windows through which

he

mind

looks

o u t

upo n a mo re extensive an d inclusive w orld ” (VRE,337-39).

Beforeconsidering he“wider self’ as it is apparentlyma nifest n re-

ligious experience, let me

brieffy

focus on an allied notion as presented in a

key metaphysical essay, “T he Experience o f Activity.” James tells us that

when discussing

the

ultimatecharacter of

our

activityexperiences, we

should remember “that each

of

them is but

a

por t ion of a wider wor ld , one

link in the vast chain of processes of experience ou t of which his tory is

made.” E very partic ular process, then, is part

of

a largcr proccss n the same

way, as I earlier sug gested, that every particular field is enco mp assed by a

larger field. “Each partial process, to him who lives th ro ug h it, defines itself

by i ts origin and goal;

bu t to

an observer with a wide r mind-span w h o

sho uld live outside of i t , the goal would appear but s a provisional halting-

place, and the subjectively felt activ ity wo uld be seen to cont inue intoobjec-

tive activities that led far beyond.” James goes on

to

say that we bec om e

habituated to defining activity experienc es by their relation to s om eth ing

more.

T h us there arises

a

ques t ion as to what kind

of

and

whose

activity it

is. While we think we are doing one thing, we ma y in reali ty be

doing

som ething quite different, s om eth ing

of

wh ich we are unaware, “For in-

stance, you think you are but drinking his glass; bu t yo u are really creating

the liver-cirrhosis that will end yo ur days”

( E R E ,

87-88).

Eventually the quest ion “Whose s the real activity?” is tan tam ou nt to the

question “What will be the actual results?” Ac cord ing toJarn es, this is mere-

ly a version of the old dispute between

mate r i d i sm

(“elementary short-span

ac t i ons s um m ing thendves ‘ b l i nd ly ’

”)

and

releofagy

(“f ar foreseen ideals

com ing with effort into act”), Jam es distinguishes three philosophical ac-

counts

of

the ul t imate ground or real agent or agents of activity: a “con-

sciousness o f w id er time-span than ours,” “ideas,” and “nerve-cells.” T h e

pragmatic difference in m ea nin g is vastly different and significant, reducing ,

as just indicated, to materialism o r teleology. W hileJames is not c la iming to

prove w hich is the c orrect ac coun t, his sym path ies clearly rest w ith the hy-

pothesis

of teleology and

a wider

thinker. “Naively we believe, and human-

ly and dramatically w e like

to

believe, that activities both

of

wider and nar-

rower span are a t work in life together, that both are real,

and

that the long-

span tendencies

yoke

the others in their service, enco uragin g them in the

right direct ion; and damping them whenhey tend in oth er ways.” Ju st how

this steering of small tendencies b y large ones is accomplished

remains

a

question to

be

pondered

by

metaphysical hinkers “for m any

years

to

come’’ ( E R E , 90-91). W hile James will n ot reach

a

solution to this question,

in A Pfrmlist ic Universe-written s om e f ou r years later-there is a sense in

which he is more confide nt, as

we

shall sh or tly see,

of

his belief that w e can



retain our individuality a nd agency cvcn

if

w e ar t encompasscd by, or co-

conscious and

confluent

with

a

larger consciousness. ThatJarncs was already

reaching toward such a view in his earlicr essay, how ever, is clearly indicated

in the description given there

of

the pragmatic meaning

of

a

widcr thinker:

I f we

assurnc a wider

thinker, i t is evident

that

his

purposcs cnvciope

mine. I

am really Iccturing4v him; and altho i cannot surely know to what end, yct i f

I

take him rcligiously,

I

can trust

i t

to

be a

good

end ,

and willingly

connive.

can

be

happy

i n thinking that my activity transmits his impulse ,

and

that his

ends

prolong

my own. So

long

as I take him religiously, in short, he

does

not

de-realize

my activitics. He tcnds rather to corroborate the reality of them, so

long

a s I believe both them

and him to b e good. ( E R E , 89)

“PART

AND PARCEL O F

A WI DER

SELF”

Let me

re turn now to A Pluralistic

Utr ivem, in

which, combined wi th

The

Varieties

of

Religious Experience, we find some of the richest texts

for

the

construction of

a

field model o f the self. I t is, as has been repeatedly under-

lined, James’s field-self tha t m ost ade quately accou nts for flow ing, co ncrete

experience while remaining open to

those

dimensions of rcality affkmed by

speculative an d fait h activity. We earlier saw that after establishing thc rcality

ofelf-compoun-ding

consciousnesses-overlapping

consciousnesses-

James reached the conc lusion that since

our states

o r

fields of consciousness

overlap bo th successively and sirnultaneously, the ‘j‘idl se l f”

is

nothing less

than the “whoIefieId,” B ut here we enterupon

a

key speculative or extrapo-

lative path, one that leads to th e heart of any effort to const ruct a model of

the

self

open to personal immortality. “Every bit

of

us at every moment is

part and parcel

of

a w idc r self, it qu ivers alon g various radii like the win d-

rose o n a compass, and the actual in its cont inuously one wi th ossibles not

yet in ou r present sight”

( P U ,

131).

This text, com bined with the earlier

cited “full

self”

one ,

while

n o t necessariIy in essential conflict w ith the pre-

sentation of the self in T h e Principles of Psychology, is nevertheless signifi-

cantly beyond i t .

We earlier saw that a materialistic inter preta tion ofJames’s do ctrin e of self

seemed plausible, particularly

if

such statements as the fol lowing were aken

in isolation: ‘‘

The

‘S e l f o f selves,’ when

carefdly

e x a t ~ i ~ ~ e d ,s forrnd to covtsist

trtaitrly of th e cirllectiorr o these peculiarrnotiorrs in the

head

or betweer1

the

head and

the throat”

( P P ,

I:288).

I

suggested that even texts

such

as

this on e arc better

und erstood wh en placed within a field model

of

the self and that the later

James would bear

out such a reading; the same is true

of

those difficult

“body-texts” n wh ich

James

appeared to identify the individu alized

self

with the.body.

A

particularlyunsettling one-“The wo rld experienced

(otherwise called thc ‘field of consciousness’) com es at all tim es with our

body as

its

centre, ccntre o f vision, centre of action, centre

of

interest”

( E R E , 86n.)-was prcsented in

a

long no te in “T he Experience o f Activity,”

and

I

think it interesting

that

a

note

to

the “part and parcel

of

a wider

self’



text sho uld bo th clarify that text

and

sup po rt the field-self doctrine bcing

suggcstcd:

T hc conscious

self

of the momcnt, the centra l

sclf,

is probably dcterrnimd to

this privileged position by its functional connexion with the body’s imminent

or present acts. I t

is

the present n c f i q self. Tho the more that surrounds i tmay

be “subconscious” to us, yet if in ts “collectiv e capac ity” i t also exerts an

active function, it may be conscious in a wide r way, conscious, as it

were,

Over

heads. ( P U , 131n.)36

Again we are con fronted w i th that am biguous , vag ue,nd elusivc “morc”

that we have been everishly pursuin g hroug h he aby rinth of con-

sciousncss. Let

us

assault

i t

again, this time from James’s description of re-

ligious

experience. T hi s experience, he says, despite

a

mult i tude of diverse

expressions, has

a

co m m on nucleus wi th two par t s o rtages: a felt uneasiness

and

a solution o r salvation through remo val

of

this uneasiness.

T h e

un-

easiness takes th e fo rm of sense of wron gne ss, and insofars the individual

suffers from and criticizes

this

wrongness , he is already beyond it and possi-

bly in tou ch with som ethin g highe r. T h e religious person, then, is aware of

compris ing a

wr ong

pa rt and-at least in germ ina l form-a better part.

When

the

solut ion

o r

salvific stage is reached, the person idcntifies

his

real

being with the germinal higher partf himself: “ H e

becomes

comciocrs

that this

higher part is conterrninorrs and cotztinuorrs w i t h a more of the same

qun t i t y ,

w h i c h is

operat ive

in

the

universe

outside of h i m , and which hecan keep in workirzg touch w i t h ,

a n d in a f a r h i o n g e t

on

board o and save h imre l fwher t

a l l

his towev

beitg

hasgotre to

pieces in the wreck”

(VRE, 400).

Several years latcr, in A Plrrralistic Urliuerse,

James repeats this description in very similar terms:

T h e believer finds that the tcnde rer parts of his personal life

are

cont inuous

with

a

rnorc

of

the same quali ty which

is

operative

in

the universe outside of

him and w hich he can keep in touch wi th , and in a fashion get on board and

save himself, when a l l his lower being has gone

to

pieces it1 the w rec k. In a

word, th e believer is cont inuous,

to

his own consciousness,

at a n y

rate, wi th a

wider self f rom which saving experiences

flow

in. ( P U , 139)

To this po int, fam es has given a vivid description o f th e way in wh ich

num erous individuals have experienced profound personal transformation.

Th e obvious ques tion , of course, is w heth er their experiential claims are

simply projections

of

their

own

subjective psyches or w he the r indeed they

are manifestations of the touch of a higher power. In sho rt , is this “more”

merely their ow n no tion ,or do es it eally exist? an d if so, in what shape? and

is italso

active?

Here speculative and theoreticcategories in a l l religions

come in to play, as well as significant divergencies of interpretation. That the

“m o re ” really exists and acts

is widely agreed

upon,

whereas there are great

differences as regards its shape (personal god, gods,

nature,

Being) and the

mode of “union”

with it . James n ow wades in with his ow n hypothesis,

which he

hopes

will

be

acceptable

to

science w hile remaining

open

to

the



124

Personal

Imrnortality:

Possibilityndredibility

claims of religious experience. T h e m ediating term, Jam cs fcels, m igh t be

the

subcor~scious

elf,

wh ich has bec om e an acceptable psychological entity.

Prescinding from an y religious considerations, “there is actually and liter-

ally m ore life in ou r otal soul than we

re

a t

any time aware

of”

( V R E ,

402).

In a text from Frederick M ycrs, wh ichJarnc s now ma kes is own, this depth

dimension of the hu m an sclf is succinctly and convincingly exp ressed:

Each of us is in reality an

abiding

psychical

entity far more extensive than he

knows-an individuality

which

can nevcr exprcss itsclf

completely

through

any

corporeal

manifestation. T h e

Self

manifests through the organism; but

there is always some part of the Self unrnanifested; and

always,

as it seems,

some power of organic expression held i n abeyance or reserve. (I’RE, 403)37

Given the reality, th en , of a self w ho se life and reality extend far beyond

w hat its state

of

consciousness may be

a t

a particular m om en t, James

is

n o w

equipp ed t o fashion his mediating hypothesis: “W hatever it may be on its

farther

side, the ‘more’ with wh ich in religious ex periencc we feel ourselves

connected is on its

hither

side the subconscious continuation of our con-

scious life,” What James appears

to

be saying is that in the first instance

the

“high er” pow er expe rienccd in thereligious life is “ prim arily the high er

faculties

of

our

hidden mind.” Hence, “ the scnse

of

union with the power

beyond us is a sense of som ething not m erely ap paren tly, but literally tru e”

( V R E ,

403).

Without reference to an y overbeliefs, according to James,

we

can posit

as

a fact “thor

the

consciot.rsyersotl is continrcouswith a wider se l f t h r ough

which saving experiertces

come.”

T hi s gives us a “posit ive content of religious

experience which . .

.

is

Iitertllly a t d objectively t rue ns

-far as i t

goes” ( V R E ,

405). Of co urs e, the qualification “as far as it goes” is James’s mediating

phrase,for tobligates thepsychologists to takereligiousexpericnce se-

riously o n his terms, wh ile not closing

off

the

‘ 3 r f h e r

side”

of

the “more”

fro m reflective living, speculation, and overbelief.

A fuller trcatment

of

this ‘yurther side o f the ‘more’ ”

and

the extrapola-

tionsandoverbeliefsrelat ing to i t m us t await o ur laterconsideration of

“God” as fashioned along Jame sian lines. We m ust here , however, follow

James

as h e sugg ests the plausibi li ty of the co ntin uity of our individual

hum an consciousness wi th som e superhuman consciousness or conscious-

nesses. Having established as

a

“certain fact” that sma ller, more accessible

portions

of

our

m ind can self-compound, Jam es contends that

w e

must con-

sider as a legit imate hyp othesis “the peculat ive assum ption of

a

similar

but

w ider com pound ing i n r em ote regions.’’ Ina sm uch as men tal facts fun ction

both s ingly and together , “we f ini te minds may sim ultaneo usly

be

co-con-

scious wi th one ano ther n

a

sup erh um an intel ligence”

( P U ,

132). Further, in

descr ibing the makeu p of the “full self’ with i ts shif ting m argins, we see

that we are at every moment co-conscious with

our own

momentary mar-

gin.

Is

i t no t possible, then, that “we ourselves form the ma rgin of some

really central seif in things wh ichs co-conscious w ith the w ho le

f

us?

May



not

you

and

I

be confluent in a highc r consciou sness and confluently active

there, tho

we

know i t not?”

( P U ,

131).

James was aware f th e act that this was an area in wh ich on e m ust dare to

hypothesize in the wildest and most imaginative fashion if one hoped to

realize evcn

a glimm er of il lumination conc erning its character. Analogies

and hypo theses sugge sted by and c onsistent with the smaller versionsf o u r

experience-not stric t for m al logical deduc tion-are the only tools avail-

able for

some

unders tanding of that vast region

of

reality with which weare

in “ ord ina ry” experience only marginally related. Th is is w hy t he views of

the psychophysicist Gustave Fechner were attractive to James and w hy he

devoted an entirc chapter in A

Plmdis t ic

UIziverse to an exposition

of

those

views.

Fechncr posited a hierarchy of overlapping souls o r consciousnesses f rom

God dow n through anearth-soul to unobservablesubconsciousstates.38

T h e aspect o f Fechner’s hyp othesis with wh ich James

is

most concerned,

and the one most relevant to the w or ld of overlapping ficlds suggested

thr ou gh ou t this essay, “is the belief that the m or e inclusive fo rm s of con-

sciousness a re in

part

consti tuted by the m or e l imited forms” witho ut being

“the mere sum

of

the more l imi ted forms.” Thcre m ight , then, be

a

wider

field with purpo ses and forms wh ich are unable

to

be

known

by

our

nar-

rower fields. Thu s, w hile we are closed against its wo rld, that world mig ht

be open

to us.

That larger world might

be a

great reservoir, po oling and

preserving hum an mem ories , and when the threshold lowcrs in exceptional

individua ls, informa tion not available to or din aryconsciousness may leak in

( P U ,

78, 135).

O n e can immediately see th e attractiveness of this hypothesis for anyone

at tempt ing

to

sugges t theplausibility of personal immortality. If we are here

and no w constituted in part

by

and par t ly cons t i tut ing

a

consciousness of

imm easurably wider, perhap s everlasting, life, thcn

a postdeath continuing

relation with such a consciousness cannot be immediately and with certainty

ruled out. We may, un kn ow n to us, be already living “w ith in” this larger

life, and certain

of

those fields now constituting the individua l self may

already be playing a role in and in a sense con stitutin g this largcr life. H enc e,

w hen

Some

of the fields o r relations n ow co ns titu tin g personal selves dis-

solve, it is possible that othe r prese ntly con stituting fields mig h t

be

con-

tinued in existence through the activity

of

this large r self.39

The

description

James gives of Fechner’s view of our relation to the earth’s sou l is along such

lines:

Fechner

likens

our individual

persons

on the earth unto

so

m a n y sense-organs

of

the earth’s soul. We add

to its

perceptive life

so long as

our

own life

lasts.

It

absorbs our perceptions, just as

they

occur, into its larger sphere

of knowl-

edge,

and

combines them with other

data

there. When one

of

us

dies, i t is

as if

an eye of the

world

were closed, for all perceptive contributions from that

par-

ticularquarter cease. But the memories

and

conceptual relations that

have



126

Personal Iirztriortality: Possibility and Credibility

spun themselves round the perceptions of that person remain in the larger

earth-life as distinct as ever, and form new relations and grow and develope

throug hou t all the future, in the sam e way in which o ur ow n distinct objects

of thou gh t, once stored in mem ory, f orm n ew relations and develope through -

ou t o ur wh ole finite life.

( P U ,

79)

In a fascinating, if somewhat obscure, passage at the end of his short essay

“How Two Minds Can Know One Thing,” James maintains that the char-

acter of “pure experience” is such that “speculations like Fechner’s of an

Earth-soul,

of wider spans of consciousness enveloping narrow ones

throughout the cosmos are . . . philosophically quite in order.” These

words immediately follow a passage that appears almost whimsical, given

the context in which James introduces it. It emerges within the context of

his effort to show that

a

pure experience- “pen,” for example-is in itself

neither physical nor mental but becomes one or the other depending on the

context or relations into which it enters. I have already expressed my diffi-

culties with this doctrine and with James’s conclusion that “pure experi-

ences . . . are, in themselves considered, so many little absolutes.” Immedi-

ately following this conclusion is a passage as elusive as it is tantalizingly

attractive for my purposes:

A pure experience can be postulated with any amount whatever of span or

field, If it exert the retrospective an d ap prop riate function on any o ther piece

of experience, th e latter thereb y enters int o its ow n conscious stream . And in

this operation time intervals make no essential difference. After sleeping, my

retrospection is as perfect as it is between tw o successive waking m om ents

of

m y time. Acc ording ly, if millions o f years later, a similarly retrospective expe-

rience should anyhow com e to birth, m y present though t would form a genu-

ine portion o f its long-span conscious life. “ Fo rm a portio n,” I say, but no t in

the sense that the two thin gs can be entitively o r substantively one-they can-

no t, for they are num erically discrete facts-but on ly in the sense that the

jhtictiotis

of my present thought, i ts knowledge, i ts purpose, i ts content and

“consciousness,” in sho rt, being inherited, w ou ld be continued practically un-

changed.

( E R E ,

66-67)

James goes on to insist that if we are to accept the hypothesis of wider spans

of consciousness enveloping narrower ones, the functional and entitative

points of view must be distinguished. He apparently wishes to avoid a static

motion of identity between the wider and narrower, which is what would

follow if the minor consciousnesses were treated “as a kind of standing ma-

terial of which the wider ones consist” (ERE,67).

“ C O N T I N U U M

OF

C O S M I C C O N S C I O U S N E S S ”

In his later writings and with increasing confidence, James expressed the

view, already present in his earliest reflective experiences, that we are not

alone in the universe, that we are not the highest conscious beings: “I firmly

disbelieve, myself, that our human experience is the highest form

of

experi-



James: Full

Self

a n d Wider Fields

127

ence extant in the universe”

( P , 143).

There are many worlds of conscious-

ness of which our present consciousness is only one, and these other worlds

must contain experiences that have meaning for our life. While, for the most

part, our world is insulated from these other worlds, they do “become con-

tinuous at certain points, and higher energies filter in”

( V R E ,

408).40James

felt, then, that the evidence was strongly moving us “towards the belief in

some form of superhuman life with which we may be in the universe as

dogs and cats are in our libraries, seeing and hearing the conversation, but

having no inkling of the meaning of it all” ( P U ,

140).41

Thus, despite his

doubt and uneasiness concerning the various “psychic” claims, he tells us in

“Final Impressions of a Psychical Researcher” that from his experience “one

fixed conclusion dogmatically emerges”:

We with our lives are like islands in the sea, or like trees in the forest. . . .

There is a continuum of cosmic consciousness, against which our indi-

viduality builds but accidental fences, and into which our several minds

plunge as into a mother-sea or reservoir. Our “normal” consciousness is cir-

cumscribed for adaptation to our external earthly environment, but the fence

is weak in spots, and fitful influences from beyond leak in showing the other-

wise unverifiable connection. Not only psychic research, but metaphysical

philosophy, and speculative biology are led in their own ways to look with

favor on some such “panpsychic” view of the universe as this.

( M S , 204)42

This passage, of course, is reminiscent of the transmission theory encoun-

tered in Hirrnnn Irnimrtnlity, reprising as it does the “mother-sea” metaphor.

The crucial difference, however, is the metaphysical framework within

which the metaphor is now suggested. To begin with, the dualism presup-

posed in Human Inznzortality is no longer operative in a metaphysics of expe-

rience that differentiates physical and mental on the basis of functions and

relations rather than ultimately different modes of being. In his discussion of

Fechner, James notes that for his own purposes, Fechner’s most important

condition was “that the constitution of the world is identical throughout”

( P U , 72).

Needless to say, as indicated by the title

A

Pluralistic Urziverse,

James does not mean “identical” in any monistic sense, either materialistic

or idealistic. But how can reality be “identical throughout” and pluralistic at

the same time? Only,

I

believe, if we recognize that the multiplicity of expe-

riences constituting reality are “fields” or processive-relational complexes,

constituting and constituted by other fields, continually changing and shift-

ing and transacting in various modes of exchange. We have followed James

in his later writings as he described this world of “fields within fields within

fields . . .” in terms of continuous and overlapping conscious fields charac-

terized by co-constitution, self-compounding, narrower enveloped within

wider. If we remember that all fields are “centers of activity,” we also avoid

the danger attached to the transmission theory, as presented in

Hurnarz

Im-

mortality,

of making human fields the merely passive instruments of a larger

consciousness or consciousnesses. Continuous transaction is a determining



3

28

P e r s o d Immortality:ossibility nrtd Credibility

characteristic

of all

fields, wide r and narrow er, highe r and lower,which

enter into the consti tut ion

of

reality.43 In a review essay James ‘ w ro te in

1903,

ust such a field metaphysics

is

expressed rather strikingly:

T h e o n l y fully comp lete concrete data are, however, the successive m om en ts

of

o u r ow n several histories taken with their sub jective person al asp ect,

s

well

as with their “objective” deliverance or “context.” After the analogy of these

m o m e n t s

of

experiences must all complete reality be conceived. Radical em-

piric ism thus leads o

the

assumpt ion

of a

collectivism of personal lives

(which

may

be of any g rade of compl ica tion , and superhuman or i n f rahuman as well

as human),variouslycognit ive of each other,variouslyconative and im-

pulsive,genuinelyevolvingandchanging by effortand r ia l ,and

by

their

interaction

and

cumu lative achievements

making

up

the

world.

(CER,

443-

44)

44

FIELD-SELF AS “SUBSTANTIVE-SELF”

Before shifting ou r focus

to

the “wider self’ extrapolatedas “God,”

I

would

like

to indicate the propriety

of

designating the field-self

we

have been de-

scribing as a “substantive-self.” Recall tha t the central

purpose

o f m y con-

cern

with the “self ’ is to

show

that it is possible to const ruct

a

model of the

self wh ich, wh ile faithful to the low of experience,

is

nevertheless open to

a

co ntinu ing existence after the cessation of some of the pa rticular spatio-

tem po ral fields by w hich it is presently constituted. I believe tha t the more

fully developed doctrine of the self suggested here avoids both the classical

Soul Substance theory and

the

classical empiricist o r phenom cn i s t one . The

former posits

a

perm anen t principle ontolog ically different

from

and under-

lying o r “be hin d” the experienced appearances or phenomena . T h e latter

identifies heself as

a

“bundle” of discreteappearances orphenomena

st reaming into and immediately out ofxistence.

We have already noted that James’s doctrine of the self as the passing o r

perishing T ho ug ht un do ub ted ly lends i tself to a phenom enistic interpreta-

t ion. When,however, this “passing T ho ug h t” is seen as related to

or

continu-

ous wi th or nveloped by a “more”-that is,

a

w ide r self or consciousness-

at

every m om en t, however brief, o fi ts existence,

a

phenomenistic interpreta-

tion is ruled out . At the same t ime the experientialharacter of the “passing

T h o u g h t ”

is

retained, and there s

no

relapse into

a

substantialist perspective

positing

a

shadow principle “behind”

our

experiences. To say, however, that

there is nothin g “beh ind” our experienced activities is n o t to say that these

activities,

as

we are

a t

any m om ent aware of them ,exhaust the full reality of

the self. For ex am ple, Freud’s “unconscious” is not “b ehin d” or “under-

neath” consciousness; rather it is anlIeged present-acting process “outside”

the present margin

of

consciousness.

The

self a t any m ome nt , as has been

repeatedly claimed, is constituted y

a

variety o f fields

or

relational processes,

m os t o f w h ichre no t in “focus” but re o n or “beyond” the margin or f r inge

of

consciousness.

Some

can

be

brought w i thin focus ; others

can

be dis-



Jotnes: Full

Selfartdider Fields 129

covered on ly indirectly, as in thc case of cells or org an s. M ystic s laim that a

self

o r

consciousness of which we are ordinari ly unaware has co m e int o

focus-moved from the ma rgin, or beyo nd, of con sciousn ess to theenter.

Jame s ma intained in his

Pvirlcip/es

$Psychology

that he could dispense with

the So ul Sub stance theory because his theory of the “pass ing Thought”

accounted for

such

features of the self as unity, identity, continuity-which

had traditionally

been

the justification for posit ing the reali ty of th e “soul .”

But James never held that the notion of “substance” was a total ly empty o r

useless

one, for

in his earliest and last w ritin gs he insisted that the c ateg ory

of substance expressed an indispensable feature n ot on ly of the self but of

reality. “To say that phenom ena inhere in

a

Substance,”

he

tells

us,

in the

Principles,

“is at bo ttom on ly to reco rd one’s protest against the notion that

the bareexistence

of

thephe nom ena is the otal ruth. A phenomenon

would

n ot itself be, w e insist, unless there were so m eth ing mort. than the

phenomenon”

(PP,

II:328). B u t even earlier, in an unpublished essay writte n

probably around 1874,James affirms the utility

of

“substan ce.” This essay,

“Against Nihil ism,” was

a

critique

of

Chauncey Wright’s positivism, which

reduced the world “to

an

assemblage of par ticular phenomena having n o

ulterior connections-ideal, substantial o r dynam ic.” According

to

Perry,

James viewed such positivism as

a

“sort

of

philosophical ‘nihilism,’ affirm-

ing that beyond the part icular phenomena there is ‘nothing’” (TC,

1524).

T h e central criticism of “nihilism” and the primary justification for theate-

gory of

substanc e is that the forme r denies “continuity,” while the latter

recognizes it . T h e est of substantial reality, according to ja m es , is “d yn am ic

conn ection with other existence s.” W hich is to say that “ a thing only has

being at all as it enters in some way into the being of other things , or con-

stitutes part

of a

universe or organ ism.

. .

. As to their

beirzg,

th ings are

continuous, and

so

far

as this is w ha t

people

mean

when

th ey a f i r m

a

sub-

stance, substance must be held to exist .”Jamess aware that som ething m ore

than this is usually m ea nt,

such

as ‘‘an other and

a

pr imordial thing

on a

plane behind that of the phenomen a, but numerical ly addit ional to them.”

Bu t Jam es nsists that

a l l he means by “substance” is the “unity wh ich com es

from the phenomena being cont inuous wi theach oth er”

(TC, I:525).45

T he emphasis upon cont inui ty , as

we

have

already

seen, did not diminish

bu t intensified as James’s metaphysics matured. While “substance”does not

bccorne

a

central term in

his

m etap hy sical writin gs it is significant that in his

last work,

Sorne Pvobl~nrs

fPhilosophy, he touches again upon the theme of

“Against Nihilism”:

What difference

in

practical experience is it supposed

to

make that w e have each

a

personal substantial

principle?

This difference, that

we

can remember

and

ap-

propriate

our

past,

calling

it

“mine.”What difference that in this book there is a

substantial principle?This, that certain optical and tactile sensations cling per-

manently together in a cluster. The fact that certuirr perceptual expericnces do seem

to

belong

together

is

thus all that

the

word

substance means.

( S P P ,

66)



130

Pcrsonnl Itnmortnlity:ossibility and Credibility

James th en goe s on to “ inqu ire wh ether instead of

being

a

principle, the

‘oneness’

affirm ed m ay no t m erely be nam e like ‘substance,’ descriptive of

thc fact that certain

specific

a d erifiable tomect ions arc found among the par ts

of

the experiential

flux”

(SPP,

66).

In keeping w ith the pra gm atic evaluation of a11 conc epts, the n, th e desig-

nation of the self

o r

reality as “substantive” is im po rtant only ins ofar as it

keeps

us

aware of or avoids closing us off f rom impor tan t d imens ions of

experience. This is w h y in a n y Jamesian consideration of personal immor-

tality, i t is im po rtan t to insist o n th e substantive

character

of

the

self while

rejecting the traditional So ul Su bstan ce theo ry. We have earlier seen that in

his critique

of

the

soul

theory, James rejects the argument that the souls of

practical importance because its alleged simplicity and substantiality are the

groundsfor nferr ing mm ortal i ty. In

a passagealreadycited,James on

“practical” grounds rejects this argument:

The

Soul, however, when closely scrutinized, guarantees no immortality of a

sort

we carejot-. Th e

enjoyment

of

the atom-like simplicity

of

their substance

in

saecula saecrrlorrrm would

not to

most people

secm

a

consummation devoutly to

be

wished.

The

substance

must give

rise

to a

stream

of

consciousness continu-

ous with the present stream, in

order

t o arouse

our

hope, but of this the

persistence

of

substance

per

se

offers

no

guarantee.

(PP,

1:330)

It

is,

of

course, this “stream of consciousness continuous with the present

stream” that has bee n stresse d in the do ctrine of flowing field-sclf, and i t is

this characteristic that is the experiential ground for any pragmatic extrapo-

lation of persona l imm ortality.

In

The Principles ofPsyclrology,

James

is polemically engaged w ith the ra-

tionalists an d hence conce rned

to

unde rline the limitations of a substance

view

of

the self.

In

the essay

“The

Sent iment

of

Rationality,” however, he

chides the antisubstantialist empiricists or failing to recogn ize an extrem ely

im po r tan t fun ct io n of “Substance”: namely, to fulfill

the “deman ds of

ex-

pectancy.” Consider

“the

not ion of immortal i ty . . .

.

W hat is this bu t

a

way

of saying that the determination of expectancy is the essential factor of ra-

tionality?” He agrees with Mill and the other empiricists that nothing is, or

need be, added to th e description of past sensational facts

by

positing an

inexperienced

substratum.

“B ut w ith r ega rd to the acts yet to

come

the

case

is

different, It do es not follow that if substance may be dropp ed from

out

conception

of

the irrecoverably past, it need

be

an equally e m pty complica-

tion to

our notions of

the

future.”james

is insisting here that “desire to have

expectancy defined” is

so

deep and central to human life “that

no

philoso-

phy will definitively t r iump h wh ich in an emp hatic ma nner denies the pos-

sibility o f gratifying this need ” W B , 69-70). He does not develop his point

further in

this

essay, b u t

it

is clear here and elsewhere that belief

in

personal

immortal i ty is one-though by n o means the only-expression of this ex-

pectancy, In an example not given by

James,

we might sugges t that any one



James: Full S e l f n r d Wider Fields 131

w ho struggles for the realization o r fulfillmen t of

a

future goal or

urpose-

achieving

a

degree, w ri ting

a

book, paint ing a picture-manifests such ex-

pectancy. Every person

so

engaged firmly believes that however much he or

she may change in the interim and however long the inter im, the person

who experiences the realization will be “substantively” the same as the

per-

so n w h o initiated thc process or processes that lcd to i t .44

A compar ison

of

the soul theory with the substantive field-self theo ry

reveals obvious similarities andsignificant differences. Bot h claim to ac-

count for unity,continu ity, dentity,endurance, ndividuali ty,and inte-

riority.

T h e

substantive-self, however, unlike th e

soul, is

not

a

principle in

itselc i t is not

a

nonempirical principle belonghg to anontologically differ-

ent order

of

being; and

it

has no reality-in-itself apart fr o m its co ns titu ting

fields.

T h e

implicat ions or mm ortali tyareagainsimilarbut different.

While personal immortality is possible for b oth , it is a “positive” possibility

for the soul. T he m os t that can

be

claimed for the substantive-self is that it

has a “negative” possibility; that

is,

i t do es no t positively exclude the pos-

sibility. Since the soul is allegedly sim ple, it is “naturally” incorruptible; and

though i t could

be

annihilated by

God,

w e can logically and rationally infer

its imm ortality. Since the su bstantive-self is an ever ch an gin g field depen-

dent

for

i ts reali ty at every m om en t up on the ields that constitute it, theres

no logical necessity for it to con t inue upo n the essation of those constitut-

ing f ields most evident to ourexperience. Inasmuch as o ne o f its here-and-

now constituting relations is with a wider field o r consciousness, however,

the possibility ca nn ot be ruled out

that this wide r field will ma intain the

hu m an self after the cessation of other cons t i tut ing

fields.

It is not legitimate

to logically infer such continuing existence, because such existence depends

upon the unknow n purposes of this wider consciousness, which may o r

may not include the continu ing existence o f those narrow er fields that are

now constitutive with it. If there are other expe riential groun ds, however,

for

believing that these na rro w er fields,

along

with their ideals, purposes,

s trivings and the l ike, are included within the purposes of the wide r con-

sciousness, then the substantive field-self as herein described presents no

logical o r experiential obstacle t o the realization

of

such purposes.



C H A P T E R 6

James: Sel fand G o d

But life, life as such,

he

protested inwardly-it

was

not

enough. How could

one be

content with

the namelessness of mere energy, with the

less

than individuality

of a power, that for a l l

its

mysterious divineness, was yet unconscious,

beneath good and evil?

”Aldous

Huxley

Eyeless i n Gaz a

Nothing is

more

reasonable than

to

suppose that

if there be anything

persona

at the bottom of

things, the way we behave to it

tnrrst

affect the

way it

behaves to

us.

“F.

C. S.

Schiller

“Axioms

as

Postulates”

The

general hypothesis governing this essay is that

a

plausible belief in per-

sonal imm ortal i ty dep end s upo n self ope n

to

con tinu ing existence beyond

the spatial and temp oral param eters of w ha t is usually referred

to as

the

“present life.”

A

key step in the direction of sup po rt ing this hypothesis

has

been taken hr ou gh the s tablishment

of

a

field-self that participates in and s

constituted by

a range

of

fields, some

of

which

can

be designated “wider” in

relat ion to the identifying “center” of the individualelf. Following

James, I

have described these wider fields in terms of

a

superhuman consciousness or

consciousnesses,delaying ill no w

a

more detailedspecification

of

such

wider consciousnesses. This br ings

us,

of course, in to the thorny and

to

s om e extent impossible question o f “God.” How ever tentative and mini-

malist a phi losophy of God may emerge, there

is

no avoiding some

consid-

eration of this question, inasmuch as

I

wish to argue that the possibility of

an

imm ortal self depends upon thegraciousness of

God.

For many-if n ot most-believers in perso nal imm ortality , it s sufficient

to believe in a divine promise of eternal lifc, avoiding any and all unsettling

dif icult ies or quest ions

by

taking

refuge

in the “mystery”

of

G od.

To some

degree, of course,

all

God-believers

must take

refuge in mystery.

But

in an

essay in p hilosophical theology, it is incu m be nt up on me, as a m in im um , t o

indicate a

view of G od that is reasonably consistent with my controlling

I32



Junes: Selfarld God I33

metaphysical assu m ption s, as well as with heview of thc self

already

presented.

In thiseffort

to

construct aGod-hypothesis,

I

will co ntin ue o utilize

James’s ideas and app roac h w ithou t claim ing to pres ent James’s definitive

doctrine

of Cod.

Rather,

I

wo uld l ike to suggest wh at mig ht bc mo re accu-

rately described as a ‘yamesian” God.

In

doing

so, I

will draw directly o n

James whe re I de em him useful, explicating points that may bc on ly im plicit

in his expressed doctrine

and

extrapolating a view of God f rom a v iew o f

reality andexperiencefundamentallyconsistent butno t otally identical

w ith that

of

janlcs. While

I

may.incidentally allude

to

s o m e

of

the dif icul-

ties and technical pro ble m s attached toJarnes’s

doctrine

of

God,

I

will for

the

most part bypass

them

in

an

at tempt

to

const ruct

a

God-hypothesis that

allows for and

is

suppor t ive

of a

belief in personal im m ortali ty .

HistoricalIy,

all

doc t r ines o fGod have em erged

from

and been bo und up

wi th a particular view

of

reality having profoun d imp lications for the ay

in

which life ou gh t to be l ived . Th us, as one com m entatorhas correctly noted:

For

James,

the mcre question as to whether to believe in

God has

momentous

practical

bearings,

regardless of whether the believer

is a

practicing Christian,

Jew.o r whatever. This is necessarily

so

because the question of God is not just

a question about the existence of another being;

t is

a question concerning the

nature of the universe, not on ly taken as a whole, but taken as its individual

parts

as

well.

1

As no ted earlier, I am presupposing m etaphysical assumptions significant ly

different fro m tho se of lassical philosophy, and any viewo f

God

consistent

with hemetaphysicalassumptions

of

pragmatism wil l

be

significantly,

tho ugh not totally, diEerent from the view

of God

drawn f rom the meta-

physical assu mp tions

of

classical thought. More specifically, as

I

shall

later

indicate,

a

radically processive-relational w orld s uch as that presuppo sed by

pragmatism

is

not cong enial to the traditional view

of

God as immutable ,

om niscient, and o mnipotent .

I

am furthe r assu m ing tha t all language, including God-language, is his-

torically, culturally, and perspectivally conditioned.

A

crucial corollary of

this assu m ption

is

the re jection of any s im ple cor resp ond encc

r

representa-

tive vicw

of language; hence, there can

be no

claim to describe God as he is

in himself.

All

God-language is sym bolic in

the

Tillichian sense

of

point ing

“beyo nd itself while participating in that to w hic h it points.”’ We ca nn ot

evaluate ou r sym bo ls, then ,

o n the

basis of so m e alleged corrcsp onde ncc

with “objective reality” but

only on

their serviceab ility

for human

life. This

does no t m ean , however, that w hat is being suggested

is

an unqualified

sub-

jectivism.

The

pra gm atic perspective rejects

bod1

classical o bjec tivism and

mod ern subjectivism3 when the former

is

unde rstood as claiming

that our

language represents

an

object (God) as it is in itself, ind ep en de ntly

of

the



h u m a n knower, and the latter s unders tood a s reduc ing the reality of God to

nothing but a projection of thc human psyche .4

Jarncs

has

frequen tly bccn misun derstood as presenting a subjectivistic

view

of

God,

A s

Ralph Ba rton Perry notes, howcver, James “insisted up on

retaining no t on ly the ideality but also the actudi ty of God-as a conscious

power beyond, with which one may cornc i nt o b encficent ~ o n t a c t . ” ~ J a m e s

himself argued, in a letter

to

Char les A . Strong, that God could be 6otf1

existent and ideal: ‘I do

not

believe it

to

be hcalthy minded to nurse the

notion that ideals are self-sufficient and require n o actualization to make us

content.

.

.

.

Ideals ou gh t to aim a t the tvarlsfbvrnation of reality-no less ”

Perry points out that James

was

not “prcpared to abandon the object ivi ty

of Go d,” however much he em phasized the vital. pcrsonal, and pragmatic

features of religion (TC,

II:348).

Thu s wh en Jam es says,

“I

myself bclieve

that the evidence for God

l ies p rim arily in inner personal cxpericnces”

P,

56), he is no t to be un der stoo d as reducing the reality

of

G od to hum an

experience.Nevertheless,hc

docs

hold hat any claims m ad e ab ou t G od

must be grounded

in

and ultimately cvaluated in tcr m s of hu m an experi-

ence. Given the am big uity in James’s use of “im m edia te experience” such

that not everyth ing

in

irnmcdiate experience is “ilnrnediate,” howcver, the

exploration of cxperience takes us bcyond the realm of “p u re imm cdiacy.’’

Th rou gh ou t this essay I have

designated

such exploratory activity “cxtrapo-

lation ,” wh ich is neith er intuitio n no r inference, neither immcdiate aware-

ness nor dedu ccd conc lusion, but ma y incorpo rate characteristics of both

these modes

of

activity. Rem em ber, extrapo lation is

a

spcculative

or

imagi-

native endeav or that mu st proceed from data given in experience, and thc

extrapolated co nclusion must b c rcasonably co nsistent w ith and potentially

enriching

of

the experience from which i t bcgan.

Whi leJames does not formally

speak of

extrapolation,

I

fccl that the

ap-

proach hc

makes

to thc God-question is best described as suc h. “Go d,” for

James,

is

aE1rrned b y a belief o r ovcrbelicf, and the obvio us qu estion is w ha t

these have to do with any extrapolating. I would suggcst that ust as thinkers

w ithin the classical tradition were not conten t simply to affirm

a

bclief in

God but a t tempted to construct rat ional arguments

for

God’s existcncc,

so

one

making a pragmaticapproachmustattempt to show thc“reason-

ableness” of

God

belief

b y

means

of

extrapolation. Thus, extrapolation

would seem to fal l somewherc between a blind , c m ative faith and an absa-

lutely compell ing logical argument. Therejection of rational arguments for

the existence of Go d, thc refo rc, s not to be equa ted with radical cxclusion

of “rcason”

from

the spherc of faith. Reflective bclicvcrs m us t atte m pt to

sho w that faith in G od is gro un de d in cxpcrience and that an yth ing w e can

legitimately say about this God must no t be in fundam ental conflict w ith

this experience b ut m us t have the possibility of cxpanding

and

deepening it.

Furthcr, faith in God must

be

dem onstrably in harm ony wi th other experi-

(LWJ, 111269-70).



entia1 claim s. “ T h e t ruth of ‘God ,’ ”Jam es ma intains, ‘‘has to run the gaunt-

let of all ou r oth er t ruth s. i t is

o n

trial by them and they on trial by it”

(P ,

56)-

James is in the broad Kantian tradition that denies

he

possibility

of

prov-

ing or disproving the existence o f God , wh ile leaving the doo r open for

belief

or

faith in God. It

is

no t that James patronizcs o r

scoffs

a t effor ts to

construct absolutclycertainarguments for God’s existence. Nor doeshe

consider it necessary to “discredit philosop hy by laborious criticism

of

its

arg um en ts,” since as

a

matter of his tor y it fails to provc its pretension to bc

‘“objectively’ convincing” or universally valid. Philosophers do w ha t

all

hu m an s do-attempt to find a r gum en t s

for

their convictions,

“for

indeed it

[philosophy]

has

to

find

thcrn.” In

brief,

then,

the

arguments serve

to

con-

firm the beliefs of bclievers b ut ar e useless for atheists

( V R E ,

344).

Of coursc, James’s reasons for rejecting the classical arg um en ts

go

m uch

deeper than sim ply no tin g that they lack univcrsal acccptance.

T h e

meta-

physics and epis temology to which

he

is com mitted exclud e thc possibil ity

of any absolute proofs, including those relating to G od . All argumen ts for

the existence of God-explicitly, the “design argurnen t”-prcsuppo se, as-

sum c, or con sid er self-evidcnt that w e live in an essentially ord ere d world,

whereas James views

order

and d isordcr

as

“purcly

human

conventions.”

Moreover,hecontends,“thereare in reality nfinitely m ore hin gs ‘un-

adapted’ to cach oth er in this wo rld than therearc things ‘adapted’; infinitely

mo re hings with rregular relations han w ith regular relationsbetween

them. But we

look

for the regular kind of thingxclusively, and ingeniously

discover and preserve it in our rncmory” (VRE,34th.). Rationalism, then,

is jus t as inadequate when arguing for God and rel igion as wh en arg uin g

against thcm . This is in kceping, of course, w ith James’s conten tion that the

whole of

o u r

me ntal life exceeds that part accounted for by rationalism.

“If

you have intuitions at all,” hc tclls us, “they

comc

from

a

deeper level of

your nature than the loquaciousevel which rationalism inhabits” (VRE,67).

I have already cited

James

to the effect that thc “evidence for

God

lies

primarily in inner persona l experiences” ( I ) , 56).7 I t

is

important , however,

to

indicate thc character of that evidence so as to avoid any interpretation

that would lead to a claimhat xperience,

evcn

my stical xyericnc c,

“proves”

the

existence of God. I have also called attention toJarnes’s conten-

tion that

a

range and variety

of

experiences sug ge st

a

“reme

o f u e a l i t y ”

present

to hu m an consciousness that

is

deep er and xnorc general than any reality

revealed by the special and p ar tic d ar senses ( V R E , 55,

58-59).

Anlong such

expericnccs are distinctivcly religious cxpcrie’nccs w ith in w hic h,

for

those

w h o have them, the objcctsof their belief arc present in “the form f

quasi-

sensiblc realities direc tly app rehe nde d” rathe r than

in

“ thc form of mere

conceptionswhich h cir ntcllectaccepts as t rue” (VRE, 59). T h em o s t

heightened form of suchexperiences are those repor ted by my stics, but

respectful

as

James

is

of

mystical experience,

he

explicitly denies that

it

can



136

Persorlal Irnntortality:ossibility atrd Credibility

be employed to draw con clusio ns bind ing up on all reflective and reasonable

persons. For the individua l w h o has the expe rience, i t is sufficient. If the

my stic can livc by it, and his

o r

her life manifestsfruitfulconsequences

flowing from i t , no one as

a

right

to

denigrate this experience. At the sam e

time, the my stic is not entitled to claim that oth ers , lacking such experi-

ences, mu st accept the mystic’s interpretation ( V R E , 336): “M ystical states

indeed wield no author i ty due s imply to thei rbeing mystical states. Bu t the

highe r one s am ong them point in direct ions to wh ich the religious scnti-

ments even

of

non-mystical men incline. They tell of thc supremacy of the

ideal, of vastness, of union, of safety, and of rest. They offer us hypotheses,

hypotheses which we may voluntarily gnore,

but

wh ich we as thinkers

cannot

possibly upset”

(VRE,

339).

I

wish

to

suggest that i t is the r ichness of the experience of those w h o ge t

singled out as mystics and the “germ

of

m ysticis m ” in all of us that serve as

the ground and st imulus for cxtrapolat ing theeali ty of God. I t is the task of

philosophical extrapolation to winnow outhose features of mystical experi-

ence that offer the g reatest possibilities for

hum an

fife. This is, of course, a

never ending process

whose

conclusions will always bc tentative andn need

of further dcveloprnent and refinement. I t mcans a con tinu ing evaluation of

the fruits

of

our

o w n experiences as well

as

those of oth ers .While

we

cannot

avoid employing “some sort of

a

standard of theological probabil i tyof o u r

ow n whenever w e assume to estimate the fruits of other men’s religion, yet

this very stan dar d has

been

begot ten outof the dr i f t o f commonife” (

VRE,

265). Elsewhere, James noted that the “gold-dust” of religious experiences

must be extricated fro m the “ quartz-san d” (“superstitions and wild-grow-

ing over-beliefs o f

all

sorts”). Yet he cautions ag ainst trying to short-circuit

this process of extrication, for the historical results of such short-circuiting

are “thin inferior abstractions” suchas “the

hollow

unreal god o f scholastic

theology,

or

the unintelligible pantheistic mo nster” of Absolutc Idealism

( P U ,

142-43). Philosophy has the task of eliminating through comp arison

the “local an d accidental” eatures hat nevitablyaccompany all “spon -

taneous eligiousconstructions.”Historic ncrustationscan be removed

from both dog m a an d w orship; b y uti lizing “th e results

of

natural science,

philosophy can also eIiminate doctrines that are now known to be scien-

tifically absurd or

incongruous”;

and “sif ting ou t in this way unw orth y for-

mulations,

she

[ph iloso ph y] can leave

a

res iduum

of

conceptions that

a t

least

are possible. With these she can deal as hypotheses, testing them in all the

m ann ers, wh ethe r negative o r positive, by which hypotheses are ever test-

ed” (VRE, 359).

Now it must

be

m ad e clear that

in

calling for extricating, sifting out, and

refining our God-reflections, James is not suggesting-even

as

an ideal-

that w e should strive to formulate one definition of Go d to wh ich all hu-

mans o ug ht to subscribe. Now here is James’s plural ism m or e in evidence

than in his denial “that the lives

of

all men shou ld show identical religious

elements.” He insists:



The divine can

mean no single quality, i t must mean a group

of qualities,

b y

being champions of

which

in alternation, different men may al l

find

w o r t h y

missions.

Each

attitude being a syllable i n human nature’s total message, it

takes thewho le

of

us

to

spell

the

meaning

out

completely.

.

. .

We

must

frankly recog nize the fact‘that we live in partial systcms, and

that

the parts

are

not interchangeable in the spi ritua l life. ( V R E ,

384)R

T h e field mo del em ploye d hroug hou t this essay is , I believe, eminently

congenial to this pluralistic view of the divin e. It involves diverse and over-

lapping fields, thereby al lowing for various modes of mutual part icipation

n o one of which exhausts any f ield, wide or narrow. The divineife, under-

stood as the widest field, enriches and is enriched by the variety

of

fields

w ith w hic h it is related. Thus , the plurality of rel igions may not

be

a neces-

sary evil to be endu red until the on e true religion is formed; rather his

plurality may be the

necessary

and only means by which the richness

of

the

divine life can be l ived and comm unicated. Needless

to

say, this does

not

diminish the need for and importance

f

abolishing those features of partic-

ular religions that lead

to

destructive relations with those belonging o other

com m un ities. Th e po int be ing ad van ced , however, is that plurality in rc-

Iigion is n o m o re destructive in itself than is plurality in art, literature, o r

music.

9

A

variation onJamcs’s doc trine that the evidence for God is found in our

inner experience is that bclief in G od is a

response

to inner needs: o u r belief

in God

“is

not due to o u r logic , b ut to our em otional wants” (TC,k493). It

would seem that there arcat least five distinc t kind s

of

needs-logical, mor-

al,esthetic,practical,

and

religiou s. Ideally, perh aps,

a

fully

realized per-

sonal life should incorporate all of these, b ut on e that does so is

a

very rare

phenomenon;

the

m or e usual s ituation is that there is

a

decided difference, at

least as to which is primary, in needs

among

individuals.

In

his essay “ 1 s Life

Worth Liv ing? ”

James argues that science is a response to a need every bit as

much

as

m ora lity or religion is. W ithout claiming to know the ul t imate

origin

of

such needs, James neve rtheless insists that there is hardly a scien-

tific law or fact “which was not first sought a f ter

. .

to gratify an inner

need.” He goes o n to say, “The inner need of believing that this w orl d of

nature is

a

sign of something more spi r i tual and eternal thantself is ju st as

strong and authoritat ive in those w h o feel i t , as the inner

need

of

uniform

laws of causation ever can be in a professionally scientific head” ( W B ,

SI).

While James never

claims

that the need

for

God is sufficient to establish

God’s existence, he does maintain that such

a

need

a t

least suggests the pos-

sibility of such

a

reality, for

“if needs

of ou rs ou trun the visible universe,

w hy may not that

b e

a sign that an invisible universe is there?” (WB, 51).

Further, James con ten ds

that

the

only

determinat ion we can make concern-

ing the nature of G od depends upon the k indof beings we are. In an early

essay,

“Reflex Action and T heism ,” James

argues

for

a

correlation between

God and the

human

mind. He first notes

that

many wri ters

were

currently

arguing that the doctrine of reflex action h ad given “the coup de gr ice to the



138

superstition of

a

God,”

while in

an earlier t im e “reflex action and all other

harmonies between the organism and the wo rld we re held to

prove God.”

Sidestepping the ssue o f proof o r disproof, James limits himself to

showing

that a God, whcthcr ex is ten t o r not, is at a l l events the kind of being

which , i f he did exist, would form

the

rrrosf

adeqrrm possible

ubject for

minds

framcd l ike our own to conceive as lying

a t

the

root of

the universe. M y

thesis . .

.

is this: that some outward rea l i ty of

a

naturc defined as

God’s

nature

mus t

be defined, is the

only

ult imate object that is at

the

sam e time rationa1

and possible for the h u m a n mind’s contemplat ion. Atlyflriq shor t qfGod is

rlot

rutionnl,

n r t y t h i r z g m o v e thotz

God

i s riot

y o s s i b l ~ , f t h e h u m a nmind be in t ru th the

t r iadic structure of

impression,

reflection, and rcac t ion w hich we t rhe outse t

allowed. (

W B ,

93)

Th oug h James in

his

later w ritin gs refines his

view of

the human mind , he

continues to the en d to peak of

God

only in terms of hu m an needs .

In

Th e

hrietier

ofReligiocfs

Expeuierrce, he states: “T he

gods

we stand

by

are thegods

we

need and can use,

the

gods whose demands o n s are reinforcements of

our dem ands on ourselves

and

o n

one another” ( V R E , 266). Further, as we

change, so will our concept ions of God, for “w hen we ceasc

to

admire or

approve w hat the definition

of

a

deity implies,

we

end by deeming that dei ty

incredible” ( V R E , 264-65).

In

a

later section I

will

develop more fully this point of the relation be-

tween

h u m a n

change and chang e in conceptions of G od , and perhaps in

God

himself. For the

moment,

let me say

a

word abo ut an

obvious

objec-

tion to James’s ty ing our h i t h in G od to o u r concrete necds: is

he

not , one

might ask, simply reflecting the historicalandculturalconditions of th e

Victorian age in wh ich he lived? While

a

description of the psychological

needs ofJames and

his

brother and sis ter Victorians would more often than

not involve

a

need for some kind of reality beyond the ordinary, how can we

bc su re that at a later

time

such needs

will

not be nonexistent?

The first part

of

the response to the objection, of course, is that ncither

James no r any on e else can “be su rc” that these necds will always be present.

But if a s i tuat ion should emergeas it already hasemerged for ome) in wh ich

such needs gene rally are tlot prcscn t , then there would no longer bc even a

question

of

the existence

or

nonexistence of God. This ,however, would only

confirmjames’s view that faith in

od

is

inscparably

bound

up

with

concrete,

specific human needs.

T h e

abstract possibility of the disappearance of such

needs wo uld not be, forJam es, theecisive issue. While on ced ing, ofc ou rse,

that

all

conceptions, including those ofscience, areistorically and culturaliy

conditioned, James does

not

accept that this entails

a

passive skepticism or a

dcstructiverelativism. T he re are good gro un ds, tho ug h ncver absolutely

certain ones, for b d i e v i r z . that certain features

of

thc

human

cond ition will

continue to cxist

in

somc form as long as hu m an s exist. James would contend

that the history

of

religions

indicates som ethin g

of

those

features, however

vaguely and inadequately. Further, he believes, an d can supply “justifying



reasons”

fo r his belief, that religious

needs

and theefforts to satisfy the m have

profoundlyenriched anddeepenedhuman life. It is possible that these

needs an d efforts will disappear in the fu tur e, b ut

if

they do-James w ou ld

con fiden tly hold-the result

will

,be

a

radical ly diminished human si tuat ion.

I t might be argued, analogously, that we cannote absolutely certain that in

future world the long-standing, o far universaI, and pcrvasivc need for art in

its various forms wdl not also disappear. Is i t possible for anyone to posi-

tively conceive of s uch

a

w or ld

as

ot he r th an radically imp overishe d?

Whatever di&culties attach

to religious c laims, James is insistent

u p o n

the

im po rtan t difikrence they ntroduc e nto heworld.The difference, o f

course, is m os t significant in

thc

modes

of

l iving to w hic h they give rise

wh ich, w erc they fundanlcntal ly the same

as

thosc brought for th

by

natu-

ralism, would be rendered worthless.

The whole de femc of religious faith hinges upon action.I f

the

action required

or inspired by the religious hypothesis is in n o way differcnt fromchat dictated

by the naturalistic hypothesis, thcn religious faith is a pure sup erfluity, better

pruned away, and cohtro vetsy abou t its legitimacy is a piece of idle trifling,

unwor thy of serious minds. 1 myself believe, of course, that the religious hy-

pothesis

gives to

the

wo rld an expression which

specifically

determines our

reactions, and

makes them

in a large part unlike what

they

m a y be

on a

purely

naturalistic

scheme

of belief. (

W B ,

32n.) 13

Commit ted asJames was t o m oder nscience and Da rwin ism , he nevertheless

was unsympathetic to the antireligious conclusions that m anywerc drawing

from them. Hc saw the hum an comm uni ty , if dcvoid of religion, as

faced

wi th a dcencrgizing anxiety border ing on despair, whichcould be con-

fronted

a t best

only wi th a kind of

stoic

rcsignation:

For naturalism, fed on recent cosmological speculations, mankind

is

in a posi-

tion similar

to

that

of

a set o f peoplc l iving on a frozen lake, surrounded by

cliffs over

which

there is no escape,

yet

know ing that l i t t lc

by

littlc the ice

is

melting, and hc nevitablc day drawing near

when

the

last

film of

it will

disappear,and

to

be drowned gnom in ious ly will

be

thehumancreature’s

portion. The merrier the skat ing, the warm er

and

more sparkf ing

the sun

by

day, and the uddicr he bonfires a t night , the

more

poignant hesadness

which one m ust take in t he mean ing of the tota l si tuat ion.

( V R E ,

120)’3

Religious experiences m ust ultim ately bc judged

on

the basis

of

“that

ele-

ment or quality in them which we an meet nowhereelse”

(VRE,

44). I f the

universal rncssage

of

rcligion were

to be

cxpresscd n

a

singlephrase t

would be: “All

is

not vanity in this Universe, whatever thc appearances rnay

suggest” ( V R E , 38-39). The empiricist rnay wellsneer

a t

this

“ as

being

empty through its universality.” We may bc

unable

to meet the empiricist’s

dema nd that wc “cash it by its concretc

filling

. .

.

for nothin g can well be

harder .”Jamcs

goes

o n to ay, howcver, that

“as

a

practical fact

its

meaning

is

so

distinct that when

uscd

as

a

prem iss in

a life, a

w ho lc charactcr may be



140 P e r s o d Immortal i ty: Possibility attd Credibility

impar ted to

the life

by it . I t, l ike

so

m an y universal concepts, is a t ruth of

orientation, serving not to define

an

end, but to detcrrninc a direct ion”

(TC,

I t

wouId be

a

grave misunderstanding

of

James’s position to view it as

restricting the implications

of

religion to human experience with no conse-

quences for the large r w orld. W he n th e w orld s interpreted religiously, it is

not the “materialistic world over again, with an altered expression”; it must

be

a differently constituted

world

such that “different events can

be

expected

in i t , different con duct mu st be required ”

C’RE, 408).

Hence, James consid-

ers the view of A bs o lu te idealism- “refined supernaturalism”-incredible

because it claims that the cxistence of G od in no way alters the com plexion

of any

of

the conc rete particulars o f experience

(VRE,

41

I).

A

G o d w h o

wo uld m ak e no difference in such experiences or wh o wo uld m ak e a dif-

ference

only

at the end of the

world

would be meaningless and

merely

ver-

bal. Insofar, how ever, as o u r conceptions of God “d o involve such definite

experiences, G o d means something for us, and may

be

real” ( C E R , 425).

When asked where the differences due to God’s existence are in fact

to be

fou nd , James confesses that he has “no hypothesis to offer beyond what the

phenomenon of ‘prayerful communion’ . . . immediately suggests.’’ H er e

he

refers again

to

that

“wider

world

of

being”

and the subliminal

self

that

were discussed

in

the last chapter.

God

can be viewed as the sym bo l for

those “transm und ane energies” that seem to pr od uc e im m ed iate effects in

the natural world with which our experience is cont inuous (VRE,411-12).

James notes that petitional prayer is only o n e m o d e of prayer and a narrow

one at that. Prayer in the

“wider

sense as meaning every kind

of

inward

c o m m u n i o n

or

conversat ion with the power recognized as divine” remains

untouc hed by scientific criticism and “is the very soul and essence of re-

l igion.”James concedes that i f nothings transacted th rou gh su ch prayer, “if

the wor ld is in no wh i tdifferent for its having

taken

place,”

then

religion is

the delusion that “m aterialists and atheists have always said it was” (VRE,

Religion, then, stands

or

falls “by

the

persuasion that effects of some sor t

genuinely do occ ur” ( V R E , 367). According to

James,

the instinctive

belief

of m an kin d is that “G od is real since

he

produces real effects.” Hence, “we

and

God

have business

with

each o ther ; and in op enin g ourselves

to

his

influence ou r d eepest destiny is fulfilled.

T h e

universe, at those

parts of

it

which our persona l being constitutes, takes

a

tu rn for the worse or

for

the

better in propor t ion

as

each of

u s

fulfills or evades God’s demands” (VRE,

406-7).

Inasmuch as it pro du ccs rcal effects, James feels that we are not

phiIosophically justificd in desig nating

the

“unseen or mystical world un-

real.” C om m un io n w ith this world results

in

work being done upon

our

finite personalities that tu rn s

us

into n ew hu m an beings, and consequences

in the way of conduct ensue in the “natural world upon our regencrative

change”

( V R E , ,

406).

1~503;

lso

TC,

II:448).

365-67).



Faith in

God,

therefore, cann ot be rcstricted to a claim about and effects

upon the individual believer

or

even upon human exper ience. Only when

faith says som ethin g abo ut rcality, such as “God’s cxistcnce is the guarantee

of

an

ideal order thatshallbe permanentlyprcserved,”does ai th“gct

wh olly free from the first imm ediate subjective cxpcricnce, and bring

a veal

hypothesis int o play.” James conten ds that a go od scientific hypothesis, in

order to bc sufficiently prolific, m ust in clud e p rop crties othe r “th an thos e o f

the ph eno m eno n it is immediately nvoked to explain.”

For

thisreason,

“God, meaningonlywhaten ters nto he religious man’s expcrience of

union, falls sh or t of being an hypothesis of this m or e useful order.

He

nceds

to enter into w ider cosmicrelations in order

to justify the ubject’s absolute

confidence and peace”

(

V R E ,

407).

Before a t tempting to spell ou t a bit m or e fully the charactcristics of a

Jamesian God, I would like to touch briefly upon

a

com plex and sensitive

issue: the qu estion of wh ethcr rel igion supplies som ething mo re than mo-

rality. T h e radical q uestion of l ife, forJa m es, is “wh ethe r this be

at

b o t t o m

a

moral or an unmora1 univcrse” W B , 84).James, of course, opts or its being

a moral univcrse, and its being so does m t depend on there being a God:

Whether

a

God

exist,

o r

whether

no

God

exist

.

.

.

we

fo rm

at any rate

a n

ethical republic. . . . And the

first

reflection wh ich this

leads

to is tha t ethics

have

as

genuineand

real

a foothold in a universewhere the highest con-

sciousness is

h u m a n , as

in

a

universe where there is a God a s well. “The

religion

of

hum anity” affords a basis

for

ethics as

well as

theism does.

( W B ,

150)

Yet tho ug h faith in Go d does not constitute thedifference between morality

and no morality, tdoes make a differencebetweenmoralities.

A

solcly

humanist icmorali ty

does

not have thepotential orenergizinghuman

beings to their

fullest:

‘41n merely human world withouta God, the appeal

to our moral energy falls short of its ma xim al stimu lating power’’

( W B ,

160). According toJames, it

is

thc diffcrence betwecn the casygoing and thc

s t renuous

mood

that m ake s th e dee pest practical diEerence in the mo ral life

of humans

(

W B , 159). Unfortunately, he wea kens his case by implying that

the s trcnuous mood is foun d only

among

religious believers, leaving him-

self open to the objection “that neither Jame s nor anyb ody clse has ever

oEered em pirical evidence for the assertion that unbelievcrs

lead

less active

or stre nu ou s lives than believers.”16 Jam es a dm its tha t “th e capacity for

the

strenuous m ood probably lies s lum bering in every man,’’ but he goes o n to

suggest that withoutbelief in God this capacity will remain unfulfilled WB,

160-61). In m y

opinion,

his

case wo uld have been stronger had he ma de a

weakcr claim: that is, that thc ov erw helm ing nu m ber of those who have

manifested and are manifesting thc strc nu ou s

mood

are encrgized by a re-

ligious belief involving either God or

a

God-surrogate such as art, science,

or

posterity. M o re speculatively, and

as

an expression o f faith, he could then



emerging out of the e ternal wor ld processes . Whilehis view has attracted

a

few sophisticated philosophers, for ob vi ou s easons it has not been attractive

to those with explicit religious concerns. The third generalview, also great-

ly

influenced

by

evolutionary theories and mod ern and contemporary sci-

ence, extrapolates a G od as coeternal but not identical with a plurality of

processes that are in part con stituted by a nd constitute the divine. Since the

relation betw een Go d and these w or ld processes is ever chan gin g, G od also

is ever chan ging. The divine chan ge, owever, does not exclude such eternal

aims as love, harmony, and unity. These aims, it is imp or tant to note , can-

not be

realized b y G o d alone but depe nd in part for their realization

upon

the cooperative endeavor of a t least some of the processes coexisting with

God.

The most systematical ly developed mode

of

this th ird general view is

found in those process theologies hose do m ina nt influence is AlfredN o r t h

W hitehead. I t should be evident , and I hope wil l become more

s o ,

that a

Jamesian p hilosoph y of G o d is also a variant of this view.

I t is in his P l r m l i s t i c Utliverse that the me taphy sical groun d for James’s

version of G od is most explici tly developed, Thiswork w a s originally deliv-

ered as a series of lectures a t Manchester College, O xf or d, in 1907. While

the principal target of the lectures was the philosophical absolutism that

do m inate d late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century philosophy, R ichard

Bernstein quite correct ly n otes that James gives us “n oth ing less than a cri-

tique of Western philosop hic thoug ht” ( P U , xxiv) . Some of the more specif-

ic and semitechnical cr i ticisms are som ewhat dated, inasmuchs the “Abso-

lute” is n o lon ge r at the center of the philosophical stage; nevertheless, a

brief review of James’s arguments is useful

for

m y purposes because they

orient us in relation to th e crucial elem ents that mu st be incorporated into

the Jamesian ph iloso ph y of God, e leme nts that I hold indispensab le for

a

viable belief in personal immortality.

A s a recent insightful commentator has noted, “Int imacy

was

the princi-

ple of ord er in James’s hierarchy of universes from 1904

on?’

N ow her e

is

the impor tance

and

centrality of “int imacy”

more

evident than in A

Pltr-

valistic Universe. Jame s irstdistinguishesmaterialistic from spiritualistic

philosop hies, giving short shrift to the forme r because it defines the wo rld

in such

a

way as

to

leave the hu m an “as

a

sor t of ou tside passenger o r alien”

( P U ,

16).

He then ifferentiates two species

of

spiritualism-duaiistic

theism an d mon istic pantheism. While not de nying

ail

intimacy

to

dualistic

theism, James m aintains that a

“higher

reach of intimacy” is suggested by

pantheistic idealism insofar

as

it

makes

“us entitatively one with God” ( P U ,

16).

He

faults dualistic theism bec ause,

picturing

God

and his creation as entities distinct from each other, [it] still

leaves the human subject outside of the deepest

reality in

the universe. God is

from

eternity complete,

it says,

and suficient

unto hirnsclc he throws off

the

world by a

free act

and

as an

extraneous substance, and he throws

off

man as a

third substance, extraneous to both the

world

and

himself.

( P U ,

16-17)



j m e s : Se f

u r d

G o d

145

Such a viewrenders

us

foreigners-outsiders, as it were-in relation to

God. W hat James finds lacking

hcre

is thc “strictly social relation ” of reci-

procity, since while

God’s

action can affect us, “he can never be affected by

ou r reaction”

( P U ,

17).

T h e “theological machinery” of ou r ancestors

is

no

longer serviceable fo r a hum an imagination formed by “the

vaster

vistas

which scientific evolutionism has opened

and

the rising tide of social de m o-

cratic ideals.” T h e “older mo narchica l theism” has been rendered obsolete;

“the place of the divine in the world must be mo re organ ic and int imate”

(PU, 18).

As

always for James, any speculative claim m us t be evaluatcd in term s o f

itsconsequencesforconcrete iving. Th us heprag m atic “difference be-

tween

living against abackground

of

foreignness and one

of

intimacy means

the difference between a general habit of wariness and one of trust.” James

suggests

that his is really a social difference, “fo r after all, th e c o m m o n

socius

of

us

all is

the

great universe whose children

we

are.” I f we are mate-

rialistic, “we must be suspicious of this socius, cautious, tense,

on

guard. If

spiritualistic, we ma y give way, embrace, and keep n o ultimate fear” PU,

19). Insofar, then,

a s

the. spiritua listic interpreta tions of reality give our life

and actions a de pth an d richness absent in materialism, he o pts fo r the for-

mer.

B y the sam e tok en , he rejects dualistic theism in favor

of

the

“pan-

theistic field

of

vision, the vision of God as the indw elling divine ather than

the external creator, and f hu m an life as part and parcel o f that deep reality”

( P U , 19).

James is convinced that

only

“some kind

of

an immanent

or

pantheistic

dei ty working n things rather thanabove them” is congenial

to

our con t em -

porary imagination (P ,

39).

But that

is not

the full story, for the brand o f

pantheism current at the t ime

was

mo nistic or absolutistic panth eism, fea-

tures

of

which clashed at least

as

stron gly with specific needs and James’s

metaphysical principles as d id dualistic theism. “As sc{ch, the absolute nei-

ther acts nor suffers, nor loves, nor hates; i t has no needs, dcsires or aspira-

tions, n o failures

or

successes, friends o r enemies, victories or dcfeats” ( P U ,

27).

Qu ite obvious ly, an Absolute o r a God so devoid of all the charac-

teristics that James discovers in life and experience could on ly

be

viewed

by him as the acme of irrelevance. W hile the “A bso lute Mind” as the substi-

tute

for God

is allegedly

the

“rational presupp osition of all particulars of

fact

.

. .

i t rema ins supreme ly indifferent

to

wh at the particular facts in

our

world actually are.”James compares the Absolute

o

the “sick lion in Esop’s

fable, all foot pri nts lead in to his den, but

rzulln

vestigia M ~ Y O Y S U ~ ~ I . ”T h e Abso-

lute then maintains no conn ection w ith the concreteness of life, and while

we are assured that all is eternal ly wel l wi th him, e leaves us to bc saved by

our own temporal devices (P , 40).

It is significant, I belicve, that while James in his later works is criticaI of

the Absolutc for

doing noth ing to aid our salvation, in an early essay, “Re-

flex A ction and Theism”

1881),

he w as critical

of

the Calvinis t ic G od for



doing everything: “A G o d

who

gives so little scope to love,

a

predestination

which takes from endeavor

all

its zest w ith all its fruit, are irrational concep-

tions, because they say to o u r m o s t cherished powers,

There

is

no object for

you”

( W B ,

100).

Yet there

is

n o inconsistency betwe en these texts, nor is

there any essential shift in James’s doctrine. Early and late

he

affirmed

a

religious need for a pow er greater than the natural: “M an is too hclpless

against the c osm ic forces, unless ther e be a wider Ally” (TC, I:383). Sirni-

lady,

at

all stages of his tho ug ht he resisted any view that deprived indi-

vidual

h u m a n

action of significance and enicacy. I t is clear, there fore, that

the

only God consistent withJanm’s long-standing concerns is on e who is

available to hum ans in their struggles bu t

who also

depends

upon

h u m a n

initiative and creativity in order

to

reaiize the divine aims.

Thos e same long-stand ing concern s ledJam es to reject absolutistic mon-

ism in

favor of

pluralism.

A

decade before writ ing A Plnrcllistic

Ul l iue rse ,

he

suggested that “th e diEerencc between monism and pluralism is perhaps the

most pregnant

of all

the di f fere xe s in phi losophy”

(tt’B,

). He nce it is not

surprising to find hi m m aintaining in the later w or k that

pluralism, in exorcizing the absolute, exorcizes

thegreat

de-realizer of

t he

only

life

we are at home in,

and

thus redeems the nature of reality

f rom

essen-

tial foreignness. Every end, reason, motive, object of

desire

or aversion,

ground

of orrow or j oy

that we feel is in the

world

of

finite multifariousness

for

only in

that

world

does

anything really

happen,

only there

do

events

come

to

pass.

( P U , 28)19

W hile affirming a pluralistic

mode

of pantheism, therefore, James rejects

that abso lutistic

brand which,

“reared

upon

pure logic,” spurns the dus t of

concrete life.

A s he

states in an oft-cited text: “ T h e prince of darkness may

be

a

gent leman,

as

we are told he

is,

but whatever the God

of

ear th and

heaven is, he can surely be no gen t lem an .

His

menial services are needed in

the dust of our human trials, even m o re than his dignity

is

needed

in

the

empyrean”

(P,

39-40).

Absolutistic pantheism is rep ug nan t to James, therefore, because it triv-

ializes

the

cha ng e, strugg le, and pain that characterize our daily living, ren-

dering them surface appearancesof the eternally unchanging ground

f

real-

ity.

In

notes for his

1903-1

904 seminar, “A Pluralistic Description o f th e

Wor ld ,”James commented , “Thecsscnce

of

m y s ys t em

s

that there is really

gr ow th.” We added that for him “ the wor ldexists only once, in one edition,

and then ju st as i t

seems.”

For the philosophies in vogue at the time, o n the

other hand, there was a comp leted eternal edit iondevoid of growth and “an

inferior, side-show, tem po ral ed itio n, in wh ich thing s seem illusorily to be

achieving andgrowing nto hatperfectionwhich really preexists. . . .

Transcendentalism has two ed i t ionsof the universe-the Ab solute being the

edition

de h e ’ ’

(TC, II:384).

in ma intaining that there is

o n l y o n e

universe, how ever, James

is

not af-



James: Sei fnr ld

G o d 147

f i rming a naturalistic cductionisrn. H e is persuadedbymysticalphe-

nomena and religious cxp erience “that ou r no rm al cxperiencc is only

a

frac-

tion”

of

experience (TC,

II:384). Phcnomcna such

as “new ranges

of

life

succeeding

on

our

most despair ing mom ents” would never

havc

becn

in-

ferred by

reason,

since “thcy are discontinuo us with the ‘natural’ cxperi-

ences they succeed upo n and invert their values.” Cr eatio n wid ens to the

view of those undergoing rel igious experience, leading to the suggest ion

that “ou r natu ral experience,

our

strictly mo ralistic and pru dential expe ri-

ence , nuy be only a frag m en t of real hum an expcricnce” ( P U , 138). This

indispensability and irreplaceability of religious expericnces, and thc inade-

quacy of “rea son ,” has been previou sly otcd and cannot

be

over-

emphasized.

In

his

1906

address to the Unitarian

Club

of

San

Francisco,

James points ou t the am biguity

of

“facts”: wh ile there are both mo ral and

physical facts suppo rting he righteousn ess, order, and beauty of reality,

there

arc also

“contrary facts in abundance ,” and the “rat ional” conclusion

reached will depend on wh ich facts havc been singled ou t. Indeed, if the

decision is left to “re aso n” alone, James is

of

the op inion that it would be

bad news for religion:

I f

your

reason

tries

to

be impartial,

if

she

resorts

to

statistical

comparison

and

asks which class of facts tip

the

balance,

and

which

way

tends the drift , she

must, i t seems to me, conclude for irreligion, rrrdess

you

g i ve her so111e more

spec$c religious experiences t o go by, for the Iast word everywh ere, according to

naturalistic

science,

is the word

of

Death, the death sentence passed by Natu re

on

plant and beast, and man and tribe, and earth and s u n

and

everything that

she has rnade.20

Returning

to

the quest ion of m on ism versus plural ism, i t must f irst

be

noted that James

ejects

bo th

in

their absolute

modes.

T h e

wo rld is both

one

and many-“one ju st so far as its parts hang togethcr by any definite con-

nexion” and “many jus t

so

far as any defini te connexion fails to ob tain ” (E‘,

76). T h e plural ism James affirms, therefore, rejects both a world that is

al-

ready comp letely o r essentially unified and one that is totaily chaotic.

Plu-

ralism

has

n o need of that dog ma tic rigoristic temp er displayed by those

who maintain that “absolute unity

brooks no

degrees.” All James’s plu-

ralism asks is that one grant

‘‘some

separat ion am on g thin gs, som e free play

of

parts,

some

real novelty

or

chance, however m inu te.”

Given

this,

“she

is

amply satisfied and willallowyou anyamount, howevergreat, o f real

union” (P ,

78).

Radical empiricism and pluralism, according o James, s tand

for

the legit-

imacy o f

s o w .

James

here touch es upon “the great question

as

to whether

‘external’ relations can

cxist”

( P U , 40-41). The d o m i n m t view of the abso-

lutism he

is

criticizing is that they could no t . The doc t r i ne of internal rela-

tions ho ldin g that everything is esserzfiaIIy included in and essentially related

to everything else, leading inevitably

to

the

Absolute

as

the

on ly

truly real



being, is the do ctrine Jam cs challenges.

T h e

technical aspccts

of

this contro -

versy necd no t concern us; for m y purposes , the impor tanceof this question

is that in affirming external relations,ames

is

allowing for a plurality of real

beings and excluding

a n y

all-inclusivc being. This in no way compromises

James’s

me taphysical relationalism, since all realities a re relational bu t are

not related to a l l oth er realities with the sam e deg ree of immediacy and

intimacy. W hat is pos ited is

a

“strung-along” rather than an “all-at-once”

universe. It is

James’s

co nte nti on that “radical empiricism

.

. . holding

to

the each-form and m ak ing of God only oneof the eaches, affords the higher

degree of in t imacy” ( P U , 26).

This view, howcver, has an impor tant and controversial mplication: t

limits

the reality

of

God.

“If

there be

a

God,

he

is

no

ab so lu te all-experiencer,

but s imply the experiencer of widest actual conscious sp an ” A d T , 72)”

This br ings us, of course, to

Jarncs’s

doctr ine of G o d

as

finite.

GOD

AS

FINITE

Whilelames is wil l ing to jet t ison the Absolute, he

s

not wil l ing to dispense

with

God

or a higher co nsciousness.

But if we drop the absolute out

of

the

world,

must

we

then conclude that

the

worId contains nothing better in the way of consciousness than o u r own

con-

sciousness? Is our whole instinctive belief in

higher

presences,

our

persistent

inner turning towards divine companionship

o

count for nothing? Is

i t

but the

pathetic illusion of beings with ncorrigiblysocial and imaginativeminds?

put63)

James contends that even if i t should prove probable that the Absolute does

no t exist, i t will no t in any ay follow “that G o d like that of D av id, Isaiah,

orJe sus may not exis t”

( P U ,

54).

He

f inds n o logical imp edim ent

to

believ-

ing in “superhum an beings w i thout ident ifying them w ith the absolute .”

The

only thing that the God

of

the

Old

and of the N ew Testament has in

com m on w i th t he A bs o lu t e is “tha t they are

a l l

three greater than m an”

In the previous section, I tou che d up on James’s affirmation

of

the reality

of “external relations.” Put very simply, this do ctrine m aintains that no t all

real relations are included in the ssence of a being. For example,

to

say that

the

“book

is

OH

the table’’ doe s not seem to imp ly

hat

the

book

is imp licated

or involved in the inner s tructure of theable OY vice

uersa.

For the absolutist

this appearance of the externality of relations would result in

a

chaotic world

of unconnected or unrelated and unrelatable realities. Hence, there

must

be

an all-inclusive mind in which all appearances of externality are overcome,

and this alone guarantees the ration ality of reality. Jam es, of course, never

claims to be able to disprove the reality of the Absolute but he

oes

find the

arguments in favor of i t unconvincing and,

more

impor tant , the not ion of

an Absolute as seriously und ermin ing

the

reality and authenticity

of

experi-

( P U ,

63-64).



ence. H e f inds both absolutism and plural ism o

be

hypotheses and the latter

to be the more plausible one: “W ha t pluralists say is that

a

universe really

connected loosely, after the pattern of our daily experience, is possiblc, and

that for certain reasons it is the hyp othe sis

to

be preferred”

( P U ,

39).

Ther e

is no

ground

for even suspecting the existence

of

a reality oth er than “that

distributed and strung-along and flowing sort of reality wh ich we finite

beings swim in” ( P U ,97). Since the “abso lute is not forced o n o u r belief

by

logic,” its rival, the “strung-alon g un finished w orld in time,”

m ay

exist ju st

as it se em s, n ot in the sha pe of an all but rather as

a

set of eaches

( P U ,

62).

The crucial implication o f a11 this, o f course, is that any God consistent

with m etaphy sical pluralism m ust be finite. W hereas absolutism maintains

that God is fully divine only in the

orm

of

totality, pluralism is “willing

to

believe that there rnay ultimately never be an all-form a t all, that the sub -

stance o f reality m ay never get totally collected, that so m e o f t m ay rema in

outside of the largest com bination of i t ever m ade”

(PV,

0). Thus w h i l ewe

are, for Jam es, “internal parts of God and no t external creations,” God is

himself a “part” rather than the Absolute when conceived pluralistically.

T h e divine functions, then, can be taken as not wholly dissimilar to ur own

functions. All realities, inc lud ing the divin e reality, have an en vir on m en t.

Since this me ans that

God

is in t ime and wo rking out a his tory just as

we

are,

“he

escapes from the foreignn ess from all that is hu m an , of the static

timeless perfect absolute”

( P U ,

143-44). Pluralism, pragm atically interpre-

ted, simply me ans that everyth ing, however vast o r inclusive, has some sor t

of genuinely “external” environment. While things are “with” one another

in man y ways, th ere is no reality hat ncludes or do m ina tes ev eryth ing .

Hence,

“ever

not

quite” has

to

be

said

of

the

best

attempts anywhere

n

the universeat

attaining all-inclusiveness. The pluralisticworld is thus more like

a federal

republic than Iike an

empire

or kingdom. However

much

rnay be collected,

however much may report itself as present at any effective centre of con-

sciousness o r action, something else is self-governed and absent and

unre-

duced to unity. ( P U , 145)2*

James contends that it is precisely th e claim that the abs olute has abso-

lutely nothing

outside

of itself that gives rise to those irrationalities and

puzzles from wh ich the finite

God

remains free. H e

goes

o n to say that

the

finite God “may conceivably have alrnost no thin g ou tside of himself .”

He

may indeed have already triumphed

over

and absorbed

“all

but the minutes t

fraction of the universe,” but however small that fraction outside him, it

reduces Go d to a “relative being, and in principle the universe s

saved

from

all the irrationalities incidental to ab so lut ism ”

( P U ,

61).

T h u s ,

whether in

theology o r philosophy, the line of Ieast resistance is to afirrn “that there is a

God,

bu t that he is

finite,

either

in

power or know ledge , o r n bo th at once”

( P U ,

141).

Such

a

God,

according to

James,

is quite com patible with

re-



150 Persorlnl Zrnrllortality:

Possibility

n ~ ~ dredibility

l igious experience, w hich c an no t “be cited as uneq uivoca lly supporting the

infinitist belief,” T h e o n lyuncq uivoc al testimony o f religious experience “is

that

wc

experience un ion w ith something larger than ourselves and i n that

union

find

o u r

grcatest

peace.”

James

insists that the practical necds

of

re-

ligious e xperienc e are adequ ately met by this elicf in

a

power a t once larger

than and con tinuous with i t (VRE,

413).

We arc incurably and inseparably

rooted in

the temp oral and f inite point of view

( P U , 23).

Exh ortat ions such

as those

of

Em er s on to “lift mine eye up ” to he s tyle of thc A bsolute which

is the on e tru e way are fruitless. “I am,” James tells us, “finitc once

for

all,

and all the categories

of

m y sym pathy are kn i t up w i th the f inite w or ld ds

such, and with things that have a his tory” ( P U , 27).

Again we see

how

James is concerned

to

safeguard the reality and signifi-

cance of concrete human exper ience. Thingswould

be

different if w e

were

merely

readers

of the cosm ic novel , “b ut we are not the rcaders

but

the vcry

personages

of

the wor ld-drama”

( P U , 27).

And it is becauseJames

also

be-

lieves that God is one , thou gh not the only one, o f the personagcs in this

drama that heefuses to excuse hi m fro m he limitations and the obstacles that

confront

a l l

the part icipants . An omniscient and omnipotent Godwould,

of

course, escape all this, but the existence of such a

God

wo uld imp ly that the

battles that

seem

so

real and imp or tant to

s

are b u t

surface events in relation

to

the “rea lly eal.” O n the contrary,Jarnes tells us, “th e facts ofstruggle seem

too deeply characteristic of the wholc frame of things for me not to suspect

that hindrance and experiment go all the way through” (TC, II:379). Elsc-

where, he a sserts:

God himsclf, in short, may draw vital strength and increase of very being

from o u r fidelity.

For

my

own

part, I d o not know what the sweat and blood

and tragedy

of

this

life

mean,

if

they mean anything hort

of

this.

I f

this life

be

not a real fight, in which something is eternally gained for the universe by

SUCCCSS, it is no better than a game of private theatricals

from

which one may

withdraw

at

will.

B ut

i t j e l s like a real fight-as

if

there were somethingreally

wild in the universe which we, with

all our

idealities and faithfulnesses, are

needed to redeem. (WB,

55)

It is evident , then, that only a finite

God

can help us a n d be in real need of

our help. He

must be

sufficiently powerful to be able to help us and be

worthy

of

our t rus t and conf idence, but

e

cannot

be

so

powerful

as

to

find

our effortsunnecessary, the reb y trivializing the mand obbing hem of

meaning and ~ igni f icance . ’~ Someth ing ofhis is captured by Perry: “ T h u s

pluralism means a finite God, who evokes

a

passionate allegiance because he

is in some measure hampered by circumstances, and dependent on theid

of

others; or because, the evil of the world being external to him, he may be

loved without reserve” (TC,1I:211-12).

Fr om James’s perspec tive, one

of

the key fruits of the notion of God as

f inite or having an environmen t o ther than himselfs

that

it avoids the clas-



Jattres: Selfartd

God

151

sicaI

paradox of

how there can be evil in

a

world creatcd by an infinitely

good and all-powerful G od . In the final analysis, perhaps, evil is a mystery

to be lived with rathe r than a problem to be solved, wh ether on James’s

terms

or

those

of

an yo nc else. Still, w e are no t en titled to

use

thc mys tery of

evil as an excuse fo r no t reflecting upo n it and attemp ting, a t

least, to re-

move the m or e

egregious

contradictions. T h e resolutions of both absolute

idealism and classical theism are unacceptable

to

Jam es, the forme r because

it denies the reality o f evil, and the latter bccause it involves

a

dualism rife

wi th the difficulties tha t we havc been detai l ing. Whatever the shortcomings

OfJames’s app roac h to evil, one th in g s clear-evil is real and is incapable of

being

overcome simply by being subsumed wi thin a higher min d. In his

h i e t i e s

ofRaligiorrs

Experience,

James

faults the attitude

of

“healthy-minded-

ness” because it fails to reco gniz e th e evil facts that m ak e

up

a gen uine por-

tion of reality

( V R E ,

134). Elsewhcrc he states: “W hatever Indian m ystics

may say about overcoming the bonds of good and evil, for

us

there is n o

higher synthesis in which the contradict ionmerges.” He

goes o n

to say that

we

should

“adm it that, whilst

some

parts are go od , oth ers are bad, and

being bad

ought

not

to

have been . .

.

possibly might not have been” (TC,

1x538).

Th is last raises,

of

course, the thorny metaphysical issue

of

the or igin of

evil and sugge sts a kindof

Manichaean account whereby evil originates out-

side God. W hile James does l i t tle more than hint a t such an accou nt, it is

consistent with his pluralism. Evil wo uld not eed to be essential if we scrap

the monistic view and “allow the world

to

havc existed from its or igin in a

pluralistic

form,

as an aggregate o r collection

of

higher and lower things and

principles.” Fro m suc h

a

perspective, evil “might

be

and ma y always have

been, an indep end ent port ion that had

no

rational or absolute

right

to live

with the rest, and wh ich we migh t onceivably ho pe

to

see go t rid

of a t

last”

(

V R E ,

1

13).24

am es conten ds chat popular

or

practical theism has not been

upset w ith a “universe

composed

of ma ny original principles”; i t has only

insisted that God

be

the supremeprinciple-in which case “God is n ot nec-

essarily responsible for the existence

of

evil; he would only

be

responsible if

it

were

not finally overcome” ( V R E , 112).

In the final analysis it is evil as a practical, n ot a speculative,

problem

that

concerns pluralistic metaphysics. “Not whyevil sh ou ld exist

at

all , but how

we

can lessen

the actual am ou nt

of

i t ,

is

the

sole question we need there

consider” ( P U ,60). This

concern for

thc lessening of evil seems tohave been

paramount in James’s m ind fro m his carlicst years. In

a

let ter to Tho m as

Ward in

1868,

he wrote: “If we can

only

bri ng ourselves to accept evil as

an

ultimated inscrutable fact, the way m ay be op en tow ards a great practical

reform

on

earth, as our aims

will be

clearly defined, and o ur energies con-

centrated” (TC,1:161).

Th us, it isJames’s co ntention that in the religious

life of

ordinary people,

God

is no t the

name

of

the whole

of

things. Rather, he

is

a

‘‘superhuman



152

person who calls us to cooperate in his purposes, and w ho furth ers ours if

they are worthy. He works in an external environ me nt, has limits, and has

enemies.” All

of

this leads James to assert: “I believe that he on ly God

w or thy o f t he nam e

mlrst

be

finitc”

( P U ,

60).

O n e final wo rd conc erning the lassical and continuing problemof recon-

ciling div ine om nipoten ce with divine goo dne ss. The re have

been

in the

past an d are in the present some sophisticated and intellectually respectable

eEorts at such reconciliation, but, following James, I think that they are and

will continue

to

be fatally flawed and unpersuasive. No com plex a r gum en t s

or

modes of reasoning are needed to indicate why,

for

m any a t least, it is

literally

inrredible to

suggest that there

is

a morally good being w ho has the

power

to

alleviate the pain and suge ring of mil l ions of innoc ent hum an

beings but for reasons know n only to him self freely chooses not to do so.

7’wo texts, on e fro m

a

modern novel and the other from

a

con tem por a r y

theological work, succinctly and sharplydelineate the

incredibility

of

such a

being.

How

mu ch

reverence can you have for a Supreme Being who

finds

i t neces-

sary to include such phenomena as phlegm and

tooth

decay n His divine

system

of

creation? What in the world

was

running through that warped,

scatological mind of His when

H e

robbed old people of the power to control

their bowel rnovementsT25

A God of absolute power who either causes

or

deliberately permits everything

that happens must take full responsibility for it himself. No thing can take

place unIess he

wills

i t . That includes Auschwitz and our devastation of Viet-

nam. Can a God

who

willingly tolerates such outrageous suffering be called

good?Is he

not

callously indifferent to both the integrity and the welfare ofhis

creatures?

A God like

that cannot be worshipped by

thinking

people today.

An y man or woman who

has

a modicum

of

human decency

is

morally superi-

or to

hirn.26

Any at tempt

to

say an yth ing specif ic abou t G od, a f ter hu ndred s of years

of

arguments and efforts, has about it a decided dimension of foolishness.

Nevertheless, i t is no t po ssib k to believe in Go d wi thout ventu r ing some

sugges t ion concerning the character of thatn wh ich on e believes. As H.

D.

Lewis has expressed

it, “No

on e can expect

or

believe any thin g w ithou t

having

Some

idea

of

wh at i t

is

that he

expect^."'^

Let m e state wh at, for

me,

is

a

minimalist belief conc erning the nature o f God: that

God

is

a

moral

person who is at least as good

as

the very best hu m an being imaginable. I

submit that we w ould j udge any hu m an being morally deficient w h o failed

to exercise all the pow er he o r she

possessed

to alleviate human suffering,

and that we therefore can no t ex pec t less

of God.

T h e classical response that

God

has

limited his use o f power

out

of respect for human freedom is

pro-

foundly

unconvincing. Imagine

a

parent who, wishing

to

respect the free-

dom

of

the

child, allows this child to

do

something

that

is

disastrous for



J m e s : ScIJand God 153

itself or for ano ther wh en i t is within the power

of

the parent to prevent it.

This is really “unimaginable.”

Recallfarnes’s contention that “when

we

cease

to

admire or approve what

the definition

of a

dcity implies, we

end

by deem ing that dei ty incredible”

( V R E , 264-65). Hence, i f God does no th ing w h en conf r on t ed by the pro-

found suffering of millions of innocent hum an beings, the only p ossibil i ty

for believing in the moral goodness of that

God is

that he was unable to d o

anything. As

Clark M.

Witliamson has expressed it,

“God

does all that God

can possibly do for

us.”28

In reviewing Williamson’s w or k, Jo hn K. Roth

criticizes this sta tem en t because he qu estion s wh ethe r a God of

such

limited

power

“is fully w or thy of worship,” The alternative Roth suggests,

howev-

er, is rather astounding: “Certainly men and wom en do no t always

do

the

best they can. T h e Ho locaust and its antece dents in th e anti-Judaism

of

the

Chris t ian church, however, may testify that God is not o n e w h oalways does

the best either.”29 Unless I

am

miss ing something here , Roth seems to be

saying that it is m ore possible to worship

a

God w h o has unlimited power

but does not alwaysxerc.ise it in the best way possiblc.

I

do not see

how

such

a God

could

be judged other than mo rally defective.

We are confro nted, then, with two inadeq uate and not total ly sat isfying

images

of

the divine:

a

God

w h o

at

every m om ent employs

all

his limited

power, or a God of unlimited power w h o fails in

numerous

instances to use

this power

for

what would appear to be very worthwhi le ends. Whether

able to be worsh ipped o r not , the former s surely a lovable Go d.

As

for the

latter God, I would not wish to worship h im and would find

i t

difficult if

not imp ossible to ove

RELATIONAL

SELF-RELATIONAL

GOD

1

have been describing reality in terms

f

a

plurality

of

fields, at least

some

of

wh ich are conscious fields. Further, we have seen that the human field of

consciousness is related to and thereby in part consti tuted y a w ide r field o r

superhuman consciousness. The fol lowing text from Perry succinctly de-

scribes James’s view

of

these relational spans

of consciousness:

Turning to the problem of unity of the world, he explained such degrees and

varieties of unity as the world possesses in terms of experienced relations. To

avoid subjectivism, he argued €or the “conterminousness” of minds, t h a t is

their convergence in

o r

towards the same experiences-defending this view

against the skepticon the one hand and the absolutist on the other. Borrowing

Peirce’s term, he adopted the “tychistic” theory that the ultimate origins of

things

are

both pIuraI and spontaneous. No philosophy, he said, can really

avoid the recognition of a sheer datum at some point. But beings of indepen-

dent and accidentalorigin can come into interaction with one another, through

a spreading“consciousness of transition.” This notion

suggests

different

“spans” of consciousness, and the possibility of a consciousness

such

as God

with

a

span far exceeding

that

of

man.

.

.

It

eliminates the problem

of

evil,



and “goes withempiric ism,personalism,democracyand reedom.” TC,

111373-74)‘’

I have been speaking of this wider field

of

consciousness specificdly as

“G od ” or “divin e,” and have indicated w h y this reali ty mu st

be

wider and

morepowerful han hehuman,

but

not necessarily all-inclusive or

all-

pow erful. Further, follow ing James,

I

have insisted on the significancc and

e f k a c y of h u m a n initiative and activity, thercby rejecting a n y versions of

Go d tha t de ny or adically dimin ish this ef icacy. Though not refcrring spe-

cifically to James, Ian Barbour

has

described

a

vicw of agen cy wh ich is

complctely consistent with that ofJamcs.

God’s

r e h i o n

to

other

agents

seems

to

require

a

sociaf

or interpersonal

analo-

gy in which a plurality

of

centers

of

initiative are pre sen t. Th e biblical

model

of

Father, after a11,

alIowed for

the presence of m a n y agcnts, rather than con-

centra t ing on the divine agent a lone.

.

. . in the process rnodcl more than one

agent may

influence

a given event, so that both God’s action and that of o the r

agents can

be

represented.3’

There is , of course, a mu ch wid er con sensus con cerning the relat ional

character of th e hu m an self than there is con cerning thc claim that on e of

those constituting relations, indeed the cen tral on e, s the relation to

a

super-

humanconsciousnessdesignated“G od .” The

most that I have claimed

throughout this essay is that

the

field-self, w hic h is widely man ifest in the

diverse modes of experience and reasonably confirmed by

a

n u m b e r of in-

tellectual disciplines, is open to

a

relation to a field that can be called divine.

Recall ju st h o w th e self as field

is

Characterized by

such

openness: as a

“f ie ld ,” the boundaryof the

self

is opcn, indefinite, and continually shifting

such that other fields are continually leaking in and leaking ou t. Th ere is,

however, s uffk icnt stab iljty and difference in the rates

of

shif t ing among

selves

and all other fields to allow us to speak of individual fields. T h e indi-

viduality of all fields, bu t pr ee m in en tly self-fields, is relational, hence rela-

tive in the sense hat inas m uc h as i tsco nstitu ting fields arecontinually

changing,

so

is the individual. Further, individual entities, including selves,

are characterized by being, and can exist

only

so i ong as they arc, centers of

activity. Since these centers a r e const i tuted by their transactions with other

centers, they are in te rdependent .

The

most crucial question, for

m y

pur-

poses,

is

w h e t h e r t h e h u m a n

elf

has,

as

one

of

i ts constituting

relations

a n d

transactions, a relation to

a wider

and

mote po we rful consciousness,

which

consciousness is able to m ain tain ts consti tut ing relation to th e self eve n in

th e absence

of

oth er relations that m ay now also partially constitute it. The

possibility of persona l imm ortality, as I have repeated ly insisted, depe nds

u p o n t h e reality of such

a

relation.

What is

needed,

of course, is a model of an emergent

self

that is consistent

with the best philosophical and scicntific evidence concerning the self

and ,

as

a

m ini m um , does no t exclude thc possibi li ty

of

such

a

superhuman con-



James: S d f n r l d God 155

stitutingrelation.

Such a

model would have to

be

const ructed a long the

following

lines.

T he hu m an self em erges f rom f ields designatcd “physical,”

bu t this self

is

ncithcr identical w ith

n o r

reducible to the physical fields fro m

which

i t

emerges and o n w hic h i t present ly depends. T he gr ou nd s for this

claim wo uld, of course,

be

th e fact that th e self pe rfo rm s activities that are

really different from the disting uish ing activities o f physical fields. W hile we

may be unable to answer

why

such

a

distinct field emerges

or

even

to

de-

scribe precisely haw or exactly when it emerges, there would appear to be

rather compelling evidence

that such a self

does emerge. There

are

both

“subjective”and“objective”data n sup po rt

of

this contention. Subjec-

tively, there is the

fprt

awareness

of

identity, continuity, freedom ,

and

the

like. Objectively,

we

are

able

to dcscribe behavior

that

is neither identical

with nor reducible

to

the behavior of o th erentities, such as plants, animals,

cells, or

atoms.

An “emerged” self has access t o and is able t o act

upon ,

participate in, and

transformoth er real fields, nclu ding self-fields,

in

a distinctivefashion,

Thu s the individual elf is a m o re encornpassing field than thos e from w hich

it em erge d and w hich are sti l l involve d in i ts cons titution. Further, this self

is able to participate

in fields

m ore enc om pas sing than itself , such as l in-

guistic, cultural, and social fields; and it does

so

in

a

m ann er no t available

to

its own subf ie lds w hen they aresolated fro m it.

I t

would seem legi t imate to

suggest that the self now takes

on

characteristics

of

those wider fields

so

as

to give i t a reality “be yo nd” the fields from w hic h it

has

emerged and upon

which tstilldepends. All

of

thisseemsphenomenologicallyverifiable,

quite apart from thc quest ion of the divine field. If so, this becomes the

experiential groun d which, wh en comb ined with

religious

experience, al-

lows

for extra pola ting the reality

of God.

Assu ming this extrapolation along the lines previously described , it may

be useful here

to

under l ine a few key aspects o f the relation between the

divine and the hum an fields. In keepin g with the m etaphys ical pluralism

discussed earlier,

I

wish

to

stress that whileall things are conn ected, they

re

not all connected to all others with a relation of immediacy. Hence, though

G od is connected to all things, and thoug hhis connections o f imm ediacy are

the greatest in existence, evenGod is not connected inmediately

to

all thing s.

More, there are degrees of imm ediacy even between God and

those

beings

w ith w ho m he is imm ediately related.

Suppose

we characterize the hu m an on the basis o f i ts imm ediacy

to

the

divine. The re wo uld be a w ide rang e and difference in the degree of this

imm ediacy even within the hum an species,

a

species distinguished as such

on t he basis

of the

potential of i ts individual members for a relation of im-

mediacy withG o d .Both individual lyand collectively, how ever,

human

beings w ou ld have to str ive, wh ether consc iously o r unconsciously, directly

or

indirectly,

to

realize and increase this relation. T h e mystical m ight serve

as the paradigm

of

the relation

of

imm ediacy between the divine and the



156 Persotla1

Itnrrrortality: Possibility

atrd Credibility

human, bu t i t wo uld be neither the exclusive nor the com plete mo de of

imrncdiacy. The long nd rduou s volutiona ry nd historicalprocess

wo uld seem almost fr ivolous if the highest mode possible of immediacy

betw een Go d and the wo rld had lready been o r is no w realized in the expe-

rience o f even on e mystic.33 Hence, this relation of imme diacy must be

a

gro win g on e, and its realizations bo th past and present can no t be restricted

to explicit mystical

or religious cxpe riences. G reat poets, scientists, artists,

composers, statesmen-indeed all truly great hum an beings, wh ether pub -

licly recognized or not-can

be

viewed as manifest ing mo des of im m ed iate

relations to a wider and r icher eality. Qu ite obv iously not every ones led

to

articulate this relationship explicitly, and even am on g th os e w ho do, it will

be variously described.

Some

might express the experience

of

a

reality “be-

yond” that of their narrow ly “person al” reality in term s of poetry, painting,

music, nature, or science. A few have, o f course, described it

in

t e rms of a

personal be ing, traditionally referred

to

as Go d.

It is this personal relationship betw een the individual and that wide r, su-

perhuman consciousness designated “God” that is th e necessary presupposi-

tion for anybelief in per son al imm ortality . Un less elief in

a

personal

God

is

possible an d plausible, there is

no

po int in even considering the possibilityo f

a belief in p erso na l i r n r n ~ r t a l i t y . ~ ~hatever difficulties Jam es ha d w ith tra-

ditional theism, he never seemed

EO

su rre nd er that personalistic character of

God that was

so

essential to it . Neg ative eviden ce for this can be found in

James’s lectu re no tes for

a

course called “Th e Phi loso phy of Ev olut ion,”

given some half-dozen times in th e years

1879-96.

Much of the coursewas

taken up w ith criticizing H erb ert Spencer’s “evolutionism,” in particular

rejecting its claim that the “unknowable” could serveas a suitable object for

religious faith. Not so, according to James: “Mere existence commands

n o

reverence whatever,

or

any o ther emot ion u nt i l i ts qual i ty

s

specified* Nei-

ther does mere cosm ic ‘power,’ unlcss it ‘makes for’ something which can

claim kinship from our sympathies.” He concludes that we might

as

well

“speak o f being irreverent to Space or disrespectful o f the Equator’’ (TC,

I:486).

A

more

positive expression of theism’s God as personal is found in “Re-

flex Ac tion and The ism.”The

two

essential features

of

theism are that “God

be conceived as the deepest power in thc universe” and that

he

be conceived

“under the form

of

a

mental pcrsonality.”Jarnes

goes

on

to

say that “God’s

personality is

to

be regarded, like an y oth er personality, as som eth ing lying

outside

of

m y ow n and o ther than

me.”

Finally, w ha tcv er the differences

between

the

div ine and hu m an personalities, they “b oth have purposes for

wh ich they care, and each can hear the other’s call” (

W B , 97-98).35

Else-

wh ere, Jam es note s that o u r religions represcnt the ‘‘more perfect and eter-

nal aspect of the universe . . . as having a personal form.”

He

goes on to say

that if w e are religious, “the unive rse is no lon ge r a mere I t to

us,

bu t a

Thou,”

and hence we.areable

to

have any

relation

with i t that

w e

are

able

to

have with another person ( W B ,

31).



j d m e s :

SeI fa t ld

God

I57

In

his

I h i e t i e s of Religious

Experience,

James

con tend s that religious indi-

viduals sce their personal concerns as the grounds

o n

which

they

encounter

and are encountered by God ( V R E , 387). Hence, “the pivot round which

the religious life

.

.

.

revolves,

is

the interest

of

the

individual

in

his private

personal destiny” ( V R E , 387). This personal God witnessed to by religious

experience is contrasted w ith the G od recogn ized b y science. Th e latter is a

“God of

universal laws exclusivcly, a

God

w ho does a wholesale, not

a

retail

business. H e cann ot acco mm oda te his processes to the convenience of indi-

viduals” ( V R E , 390). T h at Go d was explicitly affirmed by Albert Einstein

w hen

he

said that he believed “in Spinoza’s G o d w h o reveals himself in the

orderly harmony of w ha t exists , no t in

a

God w h o concerns himself wi th

the fates and actions

of

human beings.”36

In spite ofJames’s assertion that “religion

. .

.

is a mon ume nta l chapter n

the his tory

of

human egot ism” ( V R E , 387), i t

would

be g rossly misleading

to unde rstand his stress o n the individual and personal dimension of re-

ligious experience in terms

f

an atomistic individualismo r an isolating ego-

tism. The whole drift of James’s relational metaphysics, as we have repeat-

edlyseen, goes against such a narrow ing and em pty individua lism. Less

than

a

year

before

his death, he wrote

a

letter

to

his friend

and

fellow-prag-

matist,

F.

C. S. Schiller, c hid ing him fo r failing to adequately recognize the

social dime nsion

of the human si tuat ion:

It seems to

me

really fantastically formal

to

ignore

t h r

much

of

the truth

that

is

already established, namely,

tha t men do

think

in

social situations.

.

. . I

s i m p l y n s m m e t he social situntion, and

I

am sorry

that .

.

.

you balk at i t so

much.

It is not assumed merely

tactically,

for those are the terms in which I

genuinely think the matter. (TC, I:510)

James’s lan guag e has undo ubtedly

at

times been misleading, and his fer-

vent desire to affirm t he reality of the individual perhaps led h im to fail to

emphasize

sufficiently those

social

relations that w ere so stressed by Karl

M arx and John Dewey. The charge that James was a supporter of “rugged

individualism,” howeve r, is s imply w i thout mer i t . He explicitly called for

philosophers of all stripes to joi n in com batt ing “the practical,conven-

tionally thin king man , to

whom

. . . noth ing has true scriousness b u t

per-

sonal interests”

( C E R ,

24-25).

Henry Levinson is right

on

the mark

when

he contends that James “did not p it the personal and the private against the

social experience-on James’ groun ds bo th indiv idu als and their religio ns

were inevitably social. James pits the sociality of persuasion-the sociality

of friends and com patriots-against th e sociality of coercion-the sociality

of sovereigns and subjects”

(RIW’, 132).

O ne m igh t add that

by

t he s am e

token, James pits the individuality

of

persons (the individuality that is con-

structed and developed

by

transactions with other persons)against the indi-

viduality

of

ego tism (the indiv idu ality that isolates an d impo verishes itself

by turning ow ard that maginaryunrelationalcenterwhich is in tru th

“nothing”) .



158

Persorial Imttiortality: Possibility

arid

Credibility

The self as essentially social or relational is a doctrine that has appeared in

many forms in contemporary thought-not only in pragmatism but also in

Marxism, existentialism, and phenomenology, as well

as

in certain psychol-

ogies, sociologies, and anthropologies.

37

Ralph Harper gives an existen-

tialist version strikingly similar to that ofJames. “No one,” he tells us, “can

become a ‘true self’ without the encouragement of others. Identity depends

on presence, on being singled out.” Harper adds that “to be a person is to

look for a person, first to confirm one’s own reality and identity and next to

set up a relationship of mutual f~ l f i l lm en t . ”~ ~n the Principles, James sug-

gests that “a man has as m a ny social selves as there are individuals w h o recognize

and carry an image of him in their mind”

(PP,

I:281-82). He later claims that

of all our more potential selves,

the potentia l social se lf

is the most interesting,

in virtue of “its connection with our moral and religious life.” When I act

contrary to the wishes and judgments of my friends or family or “set,” and

thereby experience a diminution of my actual social self, I am strengthened

by the thought that there are “other and better possible social judges.” Even

if I have no hope of realizing the ideal social self during my lifetime or

expectation that future generations will know anything about me,

I

am still

called to pursue an ideal social self-one “that is at least worthy of approving

recognition by the highest

possible

judging companion, if such companion

there be.” James adds that “this self

is

the true, the intimate, the ultimate, the

permanent Me which I seek. This judge is God, the Absolute Mind, the

‘Great Companion’ ”

This accounts for the impulse to pray, which is

a

“nec-

essary consequence of the fact that whilst the innermost of the empirical

selves of a man is a Self of the social sort, yet it can find its only adequate

Socius in an ideal world”

(PP,

I:300-301).

Needless to say, James is only claiming here to give a phenomenological

or psychological description of distinctive human experience. It is interest-

ing to note that Dewey recognizes this same phenomenon: “One no sooner

establishes his private and subjective self than he demands it be recognized

and acknowledged by others, even if he has to invent an imaginary audience

or an Absolute Self to satisfy the demand.”39 O f course, where Dewey will

remain or become convinced that this higher self is merely “imaginary,” or

at least not “real” in any sense which might be called “objective,” James

insisted on the right to believe that this higher self-God-has

a

reality not

reducible to human or “natural” reality.

Concerning the possibility and plausibility of any belief in personal im-

mortality, then, it is inseparably bound up with our belief in

a

“Great Com-

panion” who cares for us and will bring to realization that in

us

which is

worthy of realization. In

a

late essay, James makes an observation about

those who are beset with

a

secondary personality;

I

believe that it can be

applied, properly qualified, to all human beings: “What they want in the

awful drift of their being out of its customary self, is any principle of stead-

fastness to hold on to. We ought to assure them and reassure them that we



James: Sel fand God 159

will stand by them, and recognize the true self in them to the end”

( C E R ,

508-9). Is not something very like this what we ask of God, whom alone we

believe to be capable and desirous of recognizing our true selves and keeping

them from sinking into that abyss of nothingness from which they have

emerged and which remains a continuing threat to the integrity and the very

reality of our lives? I must explore this crucial.point later; for the moment I

wish simply to emphasize our radical dependence upon God for any hope of

a life that does not, in spite of our greatest efforts and the efforts of our

human lovers, dissolve into a nothingness ultimately indistinguishable from

a

life that has never been.

It is this individual and personal relationship with God that has always

been at the center of any belief in a continuing life. According to

R.

H.

Charles, “Jeremiah was the first to conceive religion as the Communion of

the individual soul with God.

.

. . Thus through Jeremiah the foundation of

a true individualism was laid, and the law of individual retribution pro-

claimed. The further development of these ideas led inevitably to the con-

ception of a blessed life beyond the I have been suggesting

throughout this section that because we can believe w_e aie here and now in

part constituted by and in transactional relation with God, we can believe

and hope that God will maintain and continue this constituting relation even

after other relations that now make up our being have been terminated.41

I t

would seem to be a life-sustaining relation such as this of which Luke

joyfully tells us: “Now he is God, not of the dead, but of the living; for to

him all men are in fact alive.”42

The key to life, present or future, would seem to be “love.” Essential to

any love worthy of the name would seem to be a care, concern, and desire

that the one loved realize to the fullest his or her aims and ideals insofar as

this realization brings enrichment and enhancement

of

life not only to the

beloved but also to the others with whom the beloved is life-related. Where-

as God’s life is essentially love, endeavoring at every moment to enable those

loved by him to realize their life potential, all nondivine beings-humans in

particular-can fall short of their love for God and those toward whom

God’s love is directed. This, of course, is saying neither more nor less than

that loving God is inseparable from loving those whom God loves. One

cannot truly love God unless one loves those who are loved by God, since

not

to

do

so

would be in essential conflict with the aims and desires of the

beloved.

As for belief in personal immortality, it is evident that everything comes

down to the possibility of there being a loving God capable of sustaining a

relationship

of

value that has come into being within the creative process.

That we are invited to participate in this process and are promised a share in

its fruits would seem to be at the center of Christian faith. We cannot, of

course, know or feel guaranteed that we will personally share in eternal life,

but by the same token, we cannot exclude the possibility that our mode of



160

sharing wii1 be p erso nal. In the final analysis, perhaps, o u r love and t rus t in

the divine must

be

such that we here and now accept whatever mode of

sharing is possible for G od w ith ou t in any way lessening ou r dedicat ion to

those goals, values, and ideals that enhance life. O ur p rim ar y focus mu st

be

on co ntr ibut ing to the realization of

the

very best features of the creative

process and thereby to an enr ichmentof both human and divineife. In such

endeavors, we mu st be willing to act in spite

of

our ignorance as to the

precise form the ultimate fruits

of

our actions will take.

In

the final analysis,

Christians and m any o the rs believe that they live and m ove and

achieve

their

being within

a

process richer and

more

encom passing than can be know n,

one suffused with a my s tery of promise

and

vitality.

CODA BY WAY O F A N OBJECTION

A

formidable objection to a central claim of thischapter-and indeed to the

entire essay-must be ackn ow ledged , thoug h I have no fully satisfying re-

sponse to it.

I

have advanced as plausible and believable a God whose power

is

limited as

regards

the evils of experience, yet

who

is powerful enough to

save us from com plete annih ilat ion. The obv ious object ion is that , o n the

face

of

it,

more

power w ould seem necessary t o overcome the ab soluteness

of death than to overc om e mo st earthly evils.

Both

the immediate and the

reflective response to this objection can only be that we are here confronted

with an irreducible and insuperable mystery.

Every reflection up on G od m us t at some point take refuge in “mystery,”

but much depends on wh ere the m yste ry is located. T h e traditional view,

posit ing an omnipotent God, m u st say that it

is

a my stery wh y such an all-

good

God

does not use his power to alleviate suffering and obviate death.

My

view, po siting a

good

but finite

God,

m us t

say

that i t is my stery how

God’s

power

is insuf ic ien t to pro tec t us

from

suffering and death b ut sufi-

cient to

save us from t o t a l annih ih t ion . That

God

does not protect us f r o m

suffering and death is a matter

of

ind ub itable experience; that he

may

save us

from annihilation is

a

matter of faith.

On

this there is no significant dis-

agreem ent. W hat is in dispute is the kind of G o d w h o is cr ed i b l e . T h e tradi-

tional God, in possession of an eternally fulfilled and self-suffkjent

life,

de-

sires out o f his goodness to sha re this life wi th

his

creatures and freely opts

to

do

so

by su bm ittin g the m to suffering and death.

A

God unders tood

along the lines suggested in this essay wo uld

be

one w ho se ever developing

life, characterized by an intrinsic desire rzd need to share this ife, slowly and

processively brings forth diverse and distinct expressions of the div ine life.

At

a

particular stage in this process there is realized

a

m o d e of life that is

preciously close

but

still imm easurab ly distant from the center

of

the divine

life. Go d, de siring a

more

intimate union with those individua l bearers

of

this m od e of ife, chooses

to

bring this union about in

he

only way possible

by

submit t ing himself and them

o

the transform ative experiences

of

suffer-

ing

and death.

Thus,

in a life process that

is

everlastingly bringing forth new



and richer modes of life by means of t ransformation of itself, death may be a

necessary characteristic, both in the divine and nondivine modes

of

the pro-

cess.

I f

death, propo rtional to the mo de o f life, is the only means by which

new

life

can

come

for th , whether

in

God

or his creatures, then thc

goodness

of Cod is in

no

way compromiscd by the suffering and death which these

creatures must

endure

and which in

some

way are shared by

God

himself.

This does

not remove the mystery,but it do es relocate it to the center

of

the

div ine life itself.



PART

I 1

Personal Immortality:

Desirability

and



C H A P T E R 7

Immortality:

Ho p e

OY Hindrunce?

I f the hope

w c

have

learned

to rcpose in Christ

belongs to this

world

only, then we are

unhappy

beyond

all othcr

m e n .

-

Corinthians 15:19

Looking

down

into

my

father’s

dead face

for

the

last

rime

my mother

said

without

tears, without

smiles

without regrets

but with

civility

“Good night, Willie Lee, I ’ l l

see

you

in the morning.”

“Alice Walker

“Good night Willie Lee,

I ’ l l See You

in

the Morning”

In

recent years philosophers and theologians have do ne dy ing to death, and

death to no w he re n particular after the occurrence

f that catastrophic event.

“Whether we are

to

live in a future s tate,” Bishop Joseph Butlera id som e two

hundred and f if tyyears ago , “as it is the mo st impo rtant question wh ich an

be asked, so it is the most intelligible one w hic h can be expressed in lan-

guage.”’ A few contemporary thinkers consider immo rtali ty an im po rtan t

quest ion; none to m y knowledge argues

that

it is th e “ m o st intelligible.”

Among the wider population, in America

a t

least, the majority that claim to

believe in imm ortal i ty seem to conside rhat belief periph eral to faith an d life.

W hether we are to live

in

a future state seem s

to

have become

a

ques t ion

intellectually

and

existentially irrelevam2

I t

is surely “an unde niable

act,” as

HansJonas has noted, “ that the mod ern tempers uncongenial to the dea o f

i r n r n ~ r t a I i t y . ” ~hen faced with the direct question, Do you believe in

a

life

after death?” com me nts Hans Kiing, “even theologians a re e r n b a r r as ~ ed .” ~

Someth ing of this embarrassment is reflected

in

an essay by the Rom an

Catholic

thinker Joseph Blenkinsopp,

ho,

after acknowledging that it

is no

longer

easy to speak both theological ly and honest ly about

ife

after death,”

goes on to say that “the subject conveys

a t

least for the developedcon-

165



sciousness

of

Western man,

a sense

o f unreality and an absence

of

existential

concern.”S T h e process thcologian Schubert

M .

O g d e n g o e s fur ther : “What

must refirse to accept, precisely as a Chris t ian theologian,

s

that belief in ou r

subjectivc existence after deaths in

some

way a

necessary article

of

Christ ian

belief.”6

Within thecon tem po rary intel lectual andculturalambience, hen, he

most

judicious response to the immortality question would appear to

be

silence. “If

one is

asked

abruptly,”

says W illiam E rnest

Hoclung,

‘ Wha t

do

you th ink about dea th? or of the imm or ta l ityf m a n ? o r o fhe

total

sense

of life?’ assuredly one’s first im pu lse

is

~ i l e n c e . ” ~nd in

the

famous text

with which Ludw ig Wittgenstein closes his

T r ~ ~ r n h l s ,e

are admonished:

“What we cannot speak about

we

must pass over in silcnce.”8 Add to

all of

this the observation ofJon as that “in mo re than two thousand years proba-

bly everything has bcen said there

is

to

say”

( P L ,

263),

coupled w ith the

com m ent of Hock ing that “ there is an arom a of triviality attending most

argum ent about imm or ta l ity”

Mi,0),

and the case for silence seems al-

most ironclad.

Almost-but notquitc.Thequcstion stillouches toom a n yopen

wounds, superficially covered over

by

intellectual and emotional band-aids,

to allow us the luxury of total exclusion fr om ou r reflections. W hat some of

these wounds a r e will beco me eviden t later in this chap ter, but onc “topical”

comment is perhaps in order a t this point. T h e fierce resurgence of un-

critical religious e m otiv ism , East an d West,

from

the rclatively benign

to

the

positively de structive, f ro m evangclicals an d charismatics to theological tcr-

rorists and mind -destroying cults-such

phenomena,

as a minimum, indi-

cate the continue d presenc e

of

a need for m ean ing that is not being me t.

Even

if

i t wereevident that hesemovementsare b u t manifestations of

atavistic or pr imit ive longing, of infantile nostalgia, of

a

“failure of nerve,”

all

attached to an illusionary

or

delusionary desire and hope for an othe r life,

i t

would still be wor thwhi le to explore such desire and hope.

But strikingly, in the last two decades it has become increasingly evident

that we are no more conf ident of and satisfied with our simplistic

psycho-

logical and sociological explanations for these human activities than we are

with simplistic theologicalexplanations. The need to move beyond

such

inadequate accounts of the hum an con di t ions as imp ort an t as it is evident.

Even if we can no t at this stage of hum an history ma ke any signif icant

new

mo vem ents , i t might s ti ll

be

helpful to understand why we cannot. Reflec-

tion

upon

and clarification of

the

possibilities available to u s,

a t

least,

would

seem to be wor thy

of

considerat ion. “Thus,” as Jonas states, “an exam ina-

tion at this ho ur will be as m uch an examination of ourselves as an examina-

t ion of the ssue of im m orta l i ty;

nd

even

if

i t should

throw

no new l ight

o n

th e latter

.

. . it may

yet

throw some l igh t

on

the present state o f

our

mortal

condi t ion” ( P L ,

263).



167

PRAGMATISM AND FAITH

It was Kant , a long wi th Hurne,who initiated a decisive shift w ith in W cstern

culture in the approach to the ques t ions of God , f reedom , and immortal i ty .

Kan t tells us that he “ foun d it necessary

to

deny

knowledge,

in

order

to

m ake

room

forfa i th.” For

thc

m o rc positivistically rnindcd, the K antia n exclusion

o f God, f reedom, and immortal i ty from th e hallowed halls of science radi-

cally diminished the importance of such concerns and confined them

to

the

realms o f sub jectiv ity a nd em otio n. O the rs, tho se religiously inclined, saw

in the Kan tian critique wh at Kan t eviden tly intended-a way of saving re-

ligion w ith ou t placing it in fruitless co m petitio n with science. Th e lo ng ,

comp lex, and oftcn contentious his tory of the post-Kantian dispute con-

cerning science and religion is ot

of

concern here except

to

locate m y prag-

maticperspective. I believe itdefensible to placc prag m atism with in he

broad Kantian tradition insofaras it rejects all claims t o absolute certainty

or

absolute knowledge9 bu t does n ot ex cludc, indeed insists u po n, the neccssi-

ty of faith.

It

is im po rta nt to recall the processive world being assum ed, for

faith with in such

a

world takes on a m or e crucial role than does fai th within

a

wo rld wh ose struc ture and values are already essentially rcalized. Faith

within a world-in-process is not merely

a

guess as to the

way

thin gs are that

are not yet known;

rather,

it is a creative process playing

a

role in the very

making of the world-in its stru ctu re, goals,

and

values. While enhancing

the importance of faith, a processive world also increases the

risk,

personal

and collective, that accom panies all beliefs or faiths. l o

It goes w ithout saying that from the prag ma tic perspective, n o faith, in-

cluding the Ch ristian faith, is ex em pt fro m these faith conditions. Thc need

for a reflective or critical faith has been present since well before the time of

early Chris t ianity; a segment of

the

Ch ristian co m m un ity (as well as

of

other rel igious communit ies) has always felt obliged to reconcile the best

fruits of secular culture an d experience with i tsbeliefs and faith. Th at suc h

reconciliation emains a neccssity is wid ely ecogn ized . Less wid ely ac-

knowledged, ho w w er , is that the efforts to bring Chris t ianity o r

any

other

religion into harm ony wi th contemporary thinking, experience, and sen-

sibility is inlrncasurably m or e comp licated and religiously dangerous than

were earlierefforts. I f wc are

to

avoid“badfaith” o r self-deception, w e

cann ot pursue critical inqu iry pro tecte d by the absolute assurance that

the

beliefs investigated

will

remain fundamental ly unchanged or even that they

will survive such inquiry.*2

T h e more

conservative members of religious

communities-Christian and other-have always been highly sensitivc to

the threa t that critical inq uir y poses to traditional doctrines, and they have

no

d i f f d t y in m a rs ha lin g m o u nta in s

of

data in support of their view s. It is

disingenuo us, therefore, to pre ten d tha t critical reflection upon

one’s

faith

can serve

only

to

deepen and refine it. I f on e is asked, “Can

you

assure me

that if I sub ject m y belief in thc resurrection and eternal ife-beliefs that are



168 Persotla1 Irttnzortality:

Desirability

n r t d

E f i c a q

the life-blood of my sp i r it and the ground

of

meaning in

m y

life-to the

w itherin g gaze o f critical consciousness, I will not have my faith demol-

ished?” the only honest response must

be No

W ould a ny san e believer,

then, run

such

a r isk? Only i f he or sh e also believes that any faith that

cann ot stand the mo st severe critical scru tiny is no t w or thy of a h u m a n

being.

The advantages for thepurposes of a consistent imm ortality elief offered

by some m o d e of classical m etap hy sics mu st be readily

conceded.

It was

no ted above that a m in dl b o dy dualism is most congenial to and consistent

wi th the possibi2ity of im m orta l i ty. Similarly, a metaphysical dualism that

posits an essential bifurcation between the temporal

and

the eternal has rela-

tively litt le difficulty in sho w ing that belief in im m or tali ty is w orth wh ile,

significant, and reasonable-in sh or t, desirable. “T his w or ld, ” the tem po ral

world, is a kind

of

moral arena within which we are given the op po rtun ity

to prove by the m oral quali ty of our l ives that we me rit union with the

Eternal . Th e m an y and varied mo des of this view, in their diverse Eastern

and Western forms, share the judgment that the Eternal s alone that which

gives value and meaning. The temporal is of value only insofar as it is

a

reflection o f o r articipation in the Eternal or stepping-stone

to

this higher

reality. The purpose of “this wor ld ,” therefore , s to give us an opp or tuni ty

o f

so

l iving that we areiberated f ro m it. The meatzing o f this w orld is merely

located

in

the “other” wor ld .

Given such

a

world view, it makes sense to govern and direct ou r lives on

the basis or belief in im m ortality . This belief gives us our funda me ntal goal

and meaning , as well as

our

basic mo ral criterion: whateve r contributes

to

the saving of m y soul is

good;

wh atev er ob structs this salvation is ba d.

Of

course, there are both

rude

and sophisticated versionso f

such

a

belief struc -

ture.

I

have no intention of patronizing this wo rld view,

nor

of pretending

that I have disproved o r that any one can disprove it. I t is

a

long, honorable,

and in ma ny respects im m easu rably rich tradition, and I firmly believe tha t

it incorporates insights and qualities that can be igno red b y a ny altcrnative

world view only at the peril of trivialization. I t would

be

rash as well as

potentially false to c la im hat heworld viewpresentedhereadequately

achieves such incorpo ration. T h e m o st that can be claimed is that this is the

intention; it will remain

more

implicit than exp licit

and

for

the

most part

unrealized in what follows.

Recall that the task set

for this essay is to determine whether a belief in

immortal i ty is “reasonable,” given the assum ptions of pragmatism’s world

view. It should be noted that there is n o pretense of arguing for the s tronger

hyp othesis that imm ortality belief is the only “reason able,” life-enhancing,

meaning-giving belief, I propose a m uc h weaker hypothesis for exploration:

namely, that such belief is a reasonable or plausible

one.

To

support

this

hyp othesis, i t w ill

be

necessary to

show

not

only that immortality belief is



not an obstacle to life-aE1rrnation but that it contributes, or at least has the

possibility

of

contributing , distinctive insights and qualities to human life.

But how doesa pragmatist go abou t show ing that ei ther this or an y oth er

belief

is

a

w or thy

one?

T h e sh o rt answer, as already given, s on e m ust

observe whether the experiential consequences and quali tyf life that follow

from this belief are worthy.

Recall

the key points ma de in the Introd uction

concerning pragmatic evaluation. First, all conclusions of any argume nt are

for

the pragmatis talways tentative and subjecto modification

or

jet t isoning

in the light of n ew evidence. Second, a prag m atic evaluation

of a

question

such as thc one under consideration mustbe as responsive as possible to the

overwhelming mass of cumulative experience; hence, it m u st be responsive

to the data f ro m all areas

of

experience as well as from histo ry and thc

sciences. Th ird, pra gm atism s not restr icted to description-even assuming

that such description could be

more

co mp lete than it ever is-since it

also

includes a speculative or extrapolative component whereby it suggests

pos-

sibilities for

a

future course of action. Put simply, on the basis

of

the way

things are and have been, the pragm atist ventures a guess as to how they

might be.

IMMORTA LITY: ITS DESiRABiLITY

Is

immo rtali ty desirable? T h e wo rd s can be viewed as two different ques-

tions, distinct thoug h not com pletely separate. T h e first addresses itself to

the “state of imm ortal i ty” and asks wh ether i t is desirable. Everything

here

depends on

s o

describing this state thato u r response would be, “Whether or

not

such a state is possible,

I:

do not

know , but I would l ike i t to be.” Few

would dispute that

a

l ife fro m w hic h disease had been banished is desirable,

and that is a l ife both imag inable and reasonably possible, if no t prob able , in

the future. Bu t wh at ab ou t a

life

from wh ich death has been banished, an

unend ing, limitless life?

O n e o f he most repug nant pictures o f such intermin able life is fo un d

in

Ctrllivev’s

Travels.

* 3 While visiting the

Lt.rggntrggians,

Gulliver is asked if he

has yet seen any “StvuIdbvcrggr , or Imnzortais.” Me is informe d that “these

Productions were not peculiar to an yfamily, but a m ere Effect

of

Chance .”

Gulliver’s initial en thus iasm for imm ortality is quickly extinguished once

the lives of those “Immortals” is described and observed: “They commonly

acted like M orta ls, t il l ab ou t T h irt y Years old, after w hich b y D egrees they

grew me lancholy and dejected, increasing in both till they came to

Four-

score.”

Lacking

any signif icant memory and devoid o f curiosity, they we re

also physically m on strou s: “Besides the usual D efor m ities in extre m e old

age,

they acquired an additional Ghastliness in Proportion

to

their Nu m be r

of Years, which is n o t t o

be

described.’’ LittIe wonder, then, that Gulliver’s

“keen Appetite for Perpetuity of

Life

was much abated.”

The British analytical philosopher Be rna rd W illiams presents us with an



equally depressing though

less

graph ic picture of life witho ut death in his

oft-cited essay, “The Makropulos case: reflections on the tedium

of

im m or -

ta l i ty*”14Williams

argucs

that “death is no t necessarily an evil.” Death can

be

a

misfortune; hence,

we

are justified in o u r anti-Lucretian

hope

for

a

longe r rather than a shorter li fe. Bu t does i t fol low that we are “co m m itted

to want ing to be immor ta l?” No, for an endless life w ou ld be endlessly

bo ring . W illiams cites the case of Elina M akr op ulos ,

a

character in

a play by

Karel Capek. In the sixteenth century, she had received

an

elixir of life from

her father, a court physician.

A t the

time

of the action

she

is aged

342.

Her unending life has

come

to

a

state

of boredom,

indifference and coldness. Everything

is

joyless: “in the end i t is

the same,” she says, “singing a n d silence.” She refuses to tak e

the

elixir

again;

she dies; a n d the formula is deliberately destroyed

by a young woman a m o n g

the protests

of

s o m e older m e n . (E‘S, 82)

Boredom,Will iamsargucs, is not

a

co nting en t fact of ifc or Elina

Makropulos

b u t

is inseparable from an endless hum an life. He considers

several alternative rnodcls to that of Elina-among them

“serial

and disjoint

lives” and “an after-life sufficiently unlike this 1i fc”“ bu t

f inds

no convinc-

ing ground for excluding boredom: “Nothing less wil l

do

for eternity than

som ething that

makes

b o r e d o m ut7thinknb2e.”

This

question of how “think-

able” a futu re life m us t

be in

order tobe credible

is

crucial and

must

eventual-

ly be considered. For the m om en t , le t m e s imply under l ine the “profound

difficulty,” noted by Williams, “of providing any model of an unending,

supposedly satisfying,

state

o r activi ty w hich w o d d not r ightly prove bor-

ing to anyone w h o remained conscious of himself and w h o had acquired a

character, interests, tastes and im patie nce in the course of living, already, a

finite life”

( P S ,

94-95).

ThoughJames would reach , o r at least incline toward, a different conclu-

sion conc erning imm ortality, he passionately described the boredom and

longin g to escape that overcom e us when confronted wi th “ the paint ing of

any paradise o r utopia, in heaven or

on

earth.”

Th e wh ite-robe d harp- playin g heaven o f o u r abbath-schools and the ladylike

tea-table elysium represented in

Mr.

Spencer’s Da ta ofEtlrics, as the final con-

summat ion o f p rogre ss ,

re

exact ly o n a

par

in this respect-lubberlands, pure

and simple , one and

a l l .

We

look

u p o n t h e m

from

this

delicious

mess

of

in-

sanit ies and real i t ies, st r ivings and deadnesses, hopes and fears, agonies and

exul ta t ions , which forms our present state, and ted ium

vitae

is the only senti-

m ent they awaken

in

o u r breasts. To our crepuscular natures, born for

the

conflict, the Rernb randtesque m oral chiaroscuro, the shifting struggle of

the

sunbeam in the gloom, such pictures of l ight upon l ight are vacuous and ex-

pressionless, and neither to beenjoyed or unders tood. I f this

be

the frui t

of

the

victory, we say; i f the generations of ma nkin d suffe red

and

laid dawn the i r

lives; if the prophets confessed and mar ty rs sang in the fire, and al l

the

sacred

tears were shed for no o ther end than

that a

race of creatures of such unex-



arnpled insipidity should succeed, and

protract

irr suecula

sflenrlorrrm

their

con-

tented and inoffensive

lives,-why, at such a

rate,

better lose than win the

battle,

o r at all

events better ring

down the curta in beforc

thc last

act

of

h e

play,

so

that a

business

that

began

so

importantly

m a y

be

saved

from

so

sin-

gularly flat a

winding-up.

(

WB, 130)

Depressing descriptions o f a future life, as Jamesmakes clear, are n o t

confined

to

a

futu re life in anothe r wo rld; Spencer’s evolutionary Elysium

has all the tediousness of M ilton’s regained paradise. T his aises the qu estion

of

whether hope for a fu tu re life is possible on ly if we can describe it in

detail. Pcrhaps no t. B ut

I

think that those w h o believe in such a life must at

least offer

a

rough sketch of what i t ought

to

involve. In the next chapter, I

will suggest

by

way

of

extrapolation some characteristics

of

a

“desirable”

state of immortality.

First, however, f would l ike to consider

a

rnorc impor tan t meaning

of

thc

question:

Is

immortal i ty des i rable? This second meaningocuses on thehere

and now, and asks wh ethe r belief in im m orta lity is wo rth y of the best in

human beings. Is this belief life-enhancing? Does i t give depth, scope, and

meaning to human existencc? Docs i t , or at least can it, release or create

possibilities that oth erw ise w ou ld be lost or dim inish cd? In sho rt, is belief in

imm ortali ty energizing

or

dcenergizing?

An

adequate response

must

s h o w

that not only is such belief not

an

obstacle to life-affirmation bu t th at it d oe s

(or

can)

contribute distinctive insigh ts and qualities to hu m an life.

Corliss Larnont

has

stated: “The gen eral pra gm atic effects, for good o r ill,

of belief in a future existcnce a re w rit large n he his tory of the race,

whether we exam ine th e practices of ancient tribes or modern civilized na-

t i o n ~ . ” ~ ~ecause these effects are both good and bad , and because they are so

numerous and complex , any s imple judgmentased on the conse quen ces s

prec lude d. Yet indiv idua lly and collectively,

we

d o

take

posit ions on ques-

tions such as im m ortality , and n the abscnce of anyth ing appro aching rnath-

ematical proof. There remains a division on the worth o f belief in irnmor-

tality or

in

God because to this point

in

h u m a n history

the

data

embody

considerable ambiguity.

Of

course, this itself

is a

j u d g m e n t

on

which indi-

vidual pragmatists disagree. Dewey saw little r no am biguity; the vidence,

he increasingly came

to

hold, pointed to the need to rid ourselves of life-

obstructing religious beliefs.

James,

on the o ther hand , read the cumulative

record of hum an expe rience differentlyandcontinued to the end to see

positive possibilities

in these

beliefs.

Whether belief in imm ortal i ty has

a

future is

a t

best debatable. We can be

reasonablysure,however, hatunless an effort is

made

to confront he

charge that i t is antilife, it will continue only as

a

nostalgic

or

superstitious

relic even

among

those who give i t nominal consent. N ote that 1 say “con-

front,” not “refute,” for the

scope

and depth of this charge are such that

a t

best it might be neutralized, thereby leaving the door open for the ent ry of

more

positive possibilities.

There

are M arxia n, Fre ud ian, existentialist, hu-



manist, and pragmatic expressions of the charge that bel ief in im m orta l i ty s

both essentially and historically destructive of thc fullness

of

life. Whatever

their diKerences, all suc h exp ressio ns view this belief as escapist, as a be-

trayal

of

the ear th , and s sapping the hum an com mun i ty

f

energies needed

for the continuing struggle to ameliorate thevils at tending the hum ancon-

dition and to

create new potential

for

hum an dev elopm ent . “O f belief in

immortal i ty,” Dew ey states, “m or e than any other elem ent of

historic re-

ligions it

holds

g o o d ,

I

believe, that ‘religion

is

the

opium

o f the peoples’

”

(11, xiii),

BELIEF AND COUNTERBELIEF-AN EXISTENTIAL

DIALECTIC

An acceptable m od c of im m orta l i ty belief cann ot be s imply and unequivo-

cally opposed

to

its counterbelief, Abstractly or conceptually they are op-

posed-either wc are im m or tal or w e are not-but

what

we must t ry to

describe s

an

existentialsituation h ateludessuch

a

conceptualistic ei-

ther/or.16

Ca n tho se different b u t not necessarily contradictory ways of

thinking and believing

be

located within thc sam e individual? If we take

“believing ” and “think ing” existentially, as modes of life rather than as ab-

stract systems of concep ts,

I

think they can. Indeed,

I

wish

to

sugge st that

this is increasing ly the case for rcflective believers-whether in

God

o r in

hum anity. Abstractly, belief and do ub t exclude each o th er; concretely, they

coexist in an ever ch ang ing existe ntial dialectic.

Let M C t ry to relate this to th e belief in pers ona l im m ortality . In his read-

a b k and suggestive book Deatfl

and

Beyond, Andrew Grceley concludes that

“one must choose between meaning and absurdity .” ls N o w for many, per-

haps most, people this

s

an unders tandablechoice, but for otherst does not

appear

to

be

so.

T h e r e a r e t h o s e w h oxperience meaning and absurdity not

as things that one chooses but as structural characteristics of

the

h u m a n

condit ion that should be freely affirmed and acknowledged. Meaning and

absurdity do n ot exclude each o the r bu t co nfro nt us inseparably

bound

u p

w ith each other. Th e que stion is

this:

is it possible t o “live” a life suffused b y

bo th meaning a d absurd ity? M ay it not be the task, if no t the destiny, of

a t

least some to refuse the d i ~ h o t o r n y ? ~ ~h e hope is that

a

r icher modc of

human life m igh t thu s emerge-a m od e w hic h, tho ug h i t can no t yet be

conceived

and

is

a t

most vaguely

felt,

can

be

hoped

and

worked

for.’O

Just as m ean ing and absurd ity resist co nceptual reconciliation,

s o

too do

immo rtali ty and tragedy. Again we con front an abstract ei ther/or . Either

we are imm ortal an d the hum an s i tuat ions not tragic,

or

it is tragic because

we are

not

im m or tal. Th us Ju lius Seelye Bixler sees the alternative

as

“cither

belief in imm ortal i ty or m or e tragic view of life.”21Now i t may be that the

denial of immortal i ty involves

a

move tragic view o f life than its affirmation,

but

I would insist that such afi rm atio n ought

IZOC

o be

a

means for avoiding

the essentially tragic dim ens ion

of

h u m a n

life.22

Th is is perhaps the most



sensitive aspect

of

the immorta l i ty quest ion for anyone a t tempt ing

o

a f i r m

personal imm ortal i ty wh ile rem aining fai thful to the hum an cond it ion

in

som e of i t s deepest and most ser ious fea tures. M odern and contem porary

experience have intensified the tragic aspect. T h o s e w h o have lived con -

structively and creatively with conscious belief

in

the eventual annihilation

not only of them selves and those they personally loved bu t of al l human

beings have displayed a profound and admirable courage. Even if we were

able to sh ow that no on e has lived

or

is able to live with the belief in such a

total annihilation-that in spi te

of

their manifest beliefs, they have been

motivatedby surro gate im m ortali ty beliefs such as imm or ta l ity through

fame

or

posterity-even so, there is no do ub t that they have lived w ith the

acceptance

of

the cessation

of

their ow n

personal

m od e of eing. At the very

least, those

who

do

not share their belief can no t bu t

be

edified by their

dedicated disinterestedness. Bu t this is not enough;

a

defensible belief in

im m ortali ty will share the tragic experienc e occasioned by the reality

of

death. Belief in immortali ty without tragedy risks

moral

cowardice.

Many charge-and

I

find it unsettling-that the C hr is tia n faith in resur-

rection or eternal life m anifests a “failure of nerve.” Because

of

metaphysical

and mo ral cowardice, i t is alleged, Christians lack the co ura gc to face the

fact and finality

of

dea th; they palliate th e pain

of

finitude by sug arcoating it

w ith an i l lusory doctr ine

of

future

life,

Let m e say at on ce that I am unaware

of

any com pletely satisfying response to this charge, and the present go rt

is

no exception. W ithout

a

response, however, C hristian ity will become either

a

revered relic o f the past

or

an emotional crutch in the prcsent. O n e un-

satisfactory response, wh ich ironically draw s upon twen tieth-century cri-

tiques of atte m pts to establish absolute certainty, is

to

point out that since

immorta l i ty is impossible to prove o r disprove, w e are ree to believe in it. It

is naive

to

sugg est that we can dismiss M arxian, N ietzschean, Freudian, and

allied cr it iques because they have no t pro du ced w ater t ig ht arg um en ts rov-

ing the nonexistenceof

God

o r the impossibili ty of imm ortali ty. We are no t,

of

course, obliged

to

accept slavishly the conclusions

of

these critiques,

but

we cannot use ouraith to shield us from thos e features of the human condi -

tion that m any serious an d sensitive con tem po rary think ers a nd artistshave

bril liantly and disturbingly i llum inated. He nce, i t is not en ou gh

to

say that

while

I

believe in

a

future

o r

new life, I ack no w ledg e the abstract possibility

that this belief may be an i llusion. T h e possibility o f i l lusion mu st be

exis-

tential, lived, experiential. Instead

of

being juxtaposed, i t

m u s t

permeate

belief in imm ortality. B u t even this is

not

en ou gh . T he mm ortal ity-bel iever

may no t escape o r be excused from confron tat ion with the eali ty of finitude

and death. Hans Jonas,

in

descr ib ing the “m odern

temper,”

says: “We do

not wish t o

forgo

the pang and poignancy

of

finitude;

we

insist

on

facing

nothingness and having the strengtho l ive with i t”

( P L , 267-68).

Lael Wer-

tenbaker, in describing h o w her husba nd faced death, recalls a l ine f ro m Jean

Giraudoux’s

Amphitvyotz

38

in which Jupi ter

says

of

the

gods:

“But

we

miss



174 Persotla1 Imm orta lity: Desirtlbility

n r r d Ejicaiy

som ethin g, Mercury-the poignance

of

th.e transient-the ntimation

of

mortality-that sweet sadness o f grasping at’something you canno t hold.”23

It

may

be

a

Combination

of

m on um en tal self-deception, s loppy sentimen-

tality, an d p hilosoph ical absu rdity to claim that o ne can simultaneously

be-

l ieve in imm ortality or resurrection an d still experience the “pang and poi-

gnancy

of

finitude,” “the poignance of the transient.” The issuc cannot be

engaged if we remain

a t

thc psy cho logic al level, however, for the very belief

in immortal i ty maygive rise to an intem pe rateandunw orthy fear o f

death.24The t ask is to sho w wi th som eeasonable consistency that belief in

immortal i tyneither avoids thepainoffinitudenor undialectically

jux-

taposes two ant ithetical e xp er icn ce ~. ’~ T he res no question here of con-

structing

a

conc eptual mo del in wh ich these tw o experiences are perfectly

reconciled. At the sam e t ime we mu st s tr ive to ndicate h ow they m ight be

in a dialectical relationship that transforms but does not obliterate thceality

of

bo th experiences. Recall that hequestionposed f rom theoutset is

w heth er it is possible to believe in im m ortality or resu rrectio n wh ilc par-

ticipating in that contem porary sensibility w hich is to such a great extent the

consequence of the “death of G od ” an d thc dcnial of personal imm ortali ty.

T h e task is to sugg est how thexperiences of a Con temp orary believer in and

a

contemporarydenierof mm ortal itymight

s i g n i j c a n t l y

overlap. It

is

im po rtan t to avoid both making the dis tance between the two so great that

their sharing is per iphe ral and superficial, and afirrning

a

similarity so close

that, pragmatically, there is n o diEerence between them.

Whatfollows arenotes oward heconstruction

of

a more developed

tho ug h never inal onceptual m od el. I begin

by

drawingdirectly on

William James, o n wh os e wo rk m y ow n reflections are

to

a great extent a

gloss. M ore im po rtan t , in his person and inhis philosophy, James embodied

an uneasy ension between heism and

humanism,

a

tension still felt by

those striving

to

be faithfu l to bo th these traditions.

Consider two texts f rom James:

Where God is,

tragedy

is only

provisional

and

partial, and

shipwrcck

and

dissolution

are

not the absolutely

final

things.

(I’RE,

407)

Pluralism

.

. is

neither

optimistic

nor pessimistic,

but melioristic, rather. T h e

world, it

thinks,

may

be

saved, on conditiorr that

i t s

parts do their best. But ship-

wreck

in

detail,

or

even

on

the

whole,

is

among

the

open

possibilities.

(SPP,

73)

When reflecting

on

these tcxts, i t is im po rta nt to recall James’s meta phy sical

presuppositions.

We

live

in a

processive-relational world, an“unfinished

universe,”

a

“wor ld in the making .” s “personal centres of energy,” we are

related to a wider, m ore en com pa ssing processive field of energy by which

we l ive and to whose reality we co ntrib ute thro ug h our creative activities.

Finally, as a matter of belief-or “over-belief,”

as

Jam es wo uld call it-we

may designate the wider reality that is prese nt

to us

as “God.” In the two

texts und er conside ration,

we

seem

at first

to

have tw o conflicting views



conc crning tragcdy : the first sces t ragcdy as “ o d y provisional and part ial”;

the second affirms the possibility of

total

tragedy. The first rejccts the final-

ity of “sh ipwreck” ; the secord docs n o t . An apparent ly s imple way of re-

mo ving inconsistency bctwe en thc texts is to sce thc first as an expression o f

belief o r faith, the second as a philosophical s tatc m ent. Th ou gh no t com-

pletely inaccurate, such a n intcrpretation is more misleading than helpful,

however, sinceJamcs held that the ase o f every philosoph y is an act o f faith.

How then might thcse two texts

be

reconciled so that thcy arc secn as

expressing

a

healthy and creative tension rather than cither an irrational op-

position or a mere existential juxtaposit ion?Thc key,

I

believe, rests in

James’s

own

des igna tion o f his pragmatic-pluralistic philosophy as “rnclior-

istic” rather than “optimistic” or “pessimistic.” Dcscribing thcse viewpoints

in terms of world salvation, “op tim ism ” m ainta ins that the world is already

saved; “pessimism,” thathe wor ld

is

not and cannot bc saved; and

“mcliorism,” or “pragm at ism,” that the wor ld m y e saved.

It

can

be

ar-

gued that thc faith of the n lcliorist or pra gm atist, thoug h existentially and

conceptually distinct f rom that of cithe r the op timist or the essimist, shares

expcricnces with both of them.

Let us first com pare the pragm atist and the pessim ist. To begin w ith, i t is

im po rtan t to s tress that in co m pa ring

the

view that the wo rld

m a y

be

saved

with the vicw hat t cannot, wc are ma king

a

comparison not between

bclief and unbelief but betw ecn twobelief o r faith structures.

A

crucial pre-

supposition here is that thc human situation is characterizcd by metaphysical

ambiguity. In their fun dam ental faith both the pessimist and the p ragm atist

co m m it themselves to an interpretation of this am biguity. W h e n the prag-

matist belicvcs that “wherc God is, t ragedy is on ly provisional and partial,”

he neither has no r believes that

he

has remo ved the am biguo us charactcr

fro m t he existential situation. Unless

hc

continues

to

share certain expc ri-

cnces with the pessimist , he cannot s in~ultaneouslyelieve in the nonfinality

o f tragedy w hile possessing a lived awarcncss of i ts possible finality.

Now this is more than

an

abstract consideration of tw o possibilities.

T h e

pragm atist believes that tragedy is on ly provisional and hence commits h im-

self-stakes his life, as it were-on this belief.

A s

a belief, howevcr, i t offers

no guarantec and involves profound r isk. M ore im po rtan t for

my

purpose,

it does not obliterate thoseexperiences that are shared with theessimist and

that

givc

rise

to

the

awareness hat “s hip w rec k in detail,

or

even

o n

the

wh ole, is among the op en possibilities.” T h e pragmatist

and

pcssimist have

overlapping experiences bu t differ p rofo un dly in interp reting man y

of

the

data of these expericnces. T h e pragm atist, because of an cssential charac-

teristic o f his faith, can claim neither to have resolvcd the pessimist’s ques-

t ions or problems nor to have climinated those

experiences

that give rise to

the pessimist’s faith. The pra gm ati st w ho llowed his faith

to

dilutc o r m ask

such

experiences and thc evcr present threat o f nihilism they cm bo dy w ould

be

guilty

of

“bad fai th.” U nless

the

abyss brought

to

consciousness in

con-



176 Persorral

Dnmoriality:

Desirability

n r d

Eficncy

temporary thought and experience remains

a

constant possibility, faith is an

escape and a means to

a stlperJiciul

consolation.

In the concluding chapter of Pvugrnatism, James contrasts the faith o f “re-

l igious optim ism” with hat

of

his own pragmat ism.

H e

makes it qu ite clear

that the faith to w hic h a t least so m e pragmatists give assent

is

no t escapist, is

no t such hat heseriousness andsor rowso fhuman l ife arc hidden or

attenuated.

May not religious optimism be

coo

idyllic? Must d l be saved? Is

110

price to be

paid

for

the work

of

salvation? Is the last word sweet? Is

all

“yes,

yes” in

the

universe? Doesn’t the

fact

of

“no’’ stand

a t the very core of

life?

Doesn’t the

very“seriousness” that we attribute

to life

mean

that

ineluctable

noes

and

losses

form

a

part

of

it,

that there are genuine sacrifices somewhere, and

chat

something permanently drastic and bitter always remains at the bottom of its

cup?

(P,

41)

James goes o n to say that he is “w illing to take the universe to be really

dangerous and adventurous, without thercfore backing ou t and crying ‘ n o

play.’

”

An d then in lines that can

be

related d irectly, I believe,

to

the

ques-

tion of persona l imm ortality, he says, “I am willing that there shouldbe real

losses and

real

losers

.

.

.

even th o the lost eleme nt migh t be onc’s self.”

Finally, James m aintains that the “gen uine prag matist . . . is willing to live

o n a schem e of uncertified possibilities w hic h he trusts; willing to pay with

his ow n pe rson , i f eed be,

for

the realization of the ideals which he frames”

James insists that the negative an d painful features of human experience

are constituents of the world process; they are not removed by the alvation

process, tho ug h w e can believc that hey arebeing ransformed hereby.

Further, while not excluding the possibility of

a

personal share in the fruits

of this wo rk, i t

does

not make such rewarda condition

of o u r

participation.

Paradoxically, only by at tending to the

tasks

at hand “for their own sakes”

can

we legit imately ho pe for the i j

of

sharing in whatever future ifc m igh t

result. A m od el of personal imm ortali ty developed along these lines wo uld

go

a lon g wa y towa rd me eting objections that such belief is both escapist

and egotistic. A sketch of such

a

m od el will be presented in the next chapter.

First, however, it w ill be useful

to

amplify the existential dialectic related to

belief in personal immortal i ty by cons ider ingeveral thinkers w h o ar e igh-

ly critical

of

any such belief.

Z‘, 142-43).

NIETZSCHE:

I MMOR TALI TY

BELIEF

A S

ANTILIFE

De spite an occasiona l shrillness, it is Friedrich Nietzsche w h o presents

us

with the most scar ing and brutal cr i t ique of

od,

religion, and immortal i ty .

It is not

a

critique that can be refuted

or

gon e aroun d. W hether i t can be

gone

through

without consuming those who dare the journey remains a n

open question. W hat emerges

from

Nietzsche’s critique

is

not an abstract

question but a Nie tzschean one-existential andexperimental-one hat



Immortality: Hope o r Hindrance? 177

m us t be lived rather than merely conccptualized and, shor t of the grave or

perhaps madness, admits

of

n o j n n l res ting place

or

answer.

it is a comm onplace among the more perccptive comm entators to note

that there

is

no sho rtcu t to Nietzsche’s tho ugh t. Excerpts can be bo th bril-

liant and trivial w hen rem ov ed fromNietzsche’s vital and experimcntal con-

text. I t migh t be said that Nietzsch e prove s nothing but il luminates every-

thing. Though sorncthing

of

an overstatem ent, the quip

docs

caution us

against seeking proofs or arg um en ts in the usual form and, finding non e,

assuming hatnothing

of

worth has beensaid.26W hat is it, hcn , that

Nietzsche has i lluminated? N oth ing less than the l~urna n si tuat ion loosed

from both i ts philosophical and rel igious underpinnings.ietzsche’s notori-

ous

parable

of

the “death

of

God”

signals the collapse

of

Western civilization

and

the death

of

hum anity as i t has hitherto been a nd been

known

to itself.

Nevertheless Nietzsche refuses to accept nihilism as the last w or d. N ihil ism ,

on pain of self-deception, must

be

gone throug h; but , at

the

risk of self-

dissolution, we m ust endeavor to go beyo nd it. In his doctrines of will to

power, revaluation, the overm an, and eternal recurrenc e, Nietzsch e strives

to avoid the abyss.

The extent t o w hich he succeeded and/or failed is no t m y concern here .

Suffice

i t

for m y pu rpo ses to say that his is perha ps the mo st radical effort

ever made to live in a to ta l ly inlmanen tal wor ld . God,

the

immor ta l soul,

platonic forms, eternalvalues, absoluteunch ang ing essences, imm utable

scien tific laws-all ar e for Nietzsche cowardly at tempts to persuade our-

selves that we live in a rational, purposeful, meaningful world. More impor-

tant, such beliefs serve

to

obstruct the emergenceof the on ly life

worthy of

hu m an beings-one in w hich we courageously accept responsibility for the

creation of our values and ourselves. For Nietzsche,

the

only truly authentic

life

is

one s t rong eno ugh to reate meaning in

a

fundamentally m eaningless

world. To place o u r faith and ho pe in any kind

of

transcendent reality

is

to

trade

our

human bi r thr ight for amess of otherwordly pot tage. Inasmuchas

there is n o “bey ond,” an y transcend ent belief is an expression of the wors t

and most t ruly destructive mode of nihilism. In

The

Antichrist, writ ten in

the last year of his sane Iife, Nietzsche expresses

his

view trenchantly and

powerfully:

When one places life’s center of gravity not in life but in the “bcyond”-iin

nathingtms-one deprives Iife of its center of gravity altogether. The great lie

of personal immortalitydestroys all reason,everything natural n the in-

stincts-whatever in the instincts is beneficent and life-promoting

o r

guaran-

tees

a

future now

arouses

mistrust.

To

live

so,

that there

is no

onger any

sen se

in living,

that

now becomes the “sense”

of

life. Why communal sense, why

anyfurther gratitude for descent and ancestors, why cooperate,trust,pro-

mote,

and

envisage any common welfare?27

Nietzsch e, then, wishes to overcom e nihilism but insists that this can be

do ne on ly in high ly qualified sense.28H e tells

us

that nihilism is

ambiguous,



ma nifesting itself in

clclive

and

passive

modes .

I t is

the latter, represented by

all “otherw orldly” philosoph ies and religions, that

h e

denounces n

such

passionate term s and describes as “decline an d recession of the power

of

the

spir i t ,”

L‘Active

ihil ism,” on

the

other hand,

is

celebrated and pur suc d, for t

is

“ a

sign of increased pow er

of

t he sp i r i t. ”29 Theneatness of this distinc-

tion, however, masks the depths and terrors

of

nihilism wh ich Nietzsch e

experienced in his ow n

life

and wh ich he saw as the forthcom ing fate

of

humanity.3* H e did not ake lightly, herefore, he“death

of

God,” and

some

of his stronges t crit icism was directed against “th os e w ho

d o

not

be-

lieve in God,” since they have no t faced’up to th e radically threatening con-

sequences of the loss

of

religious

belief.

Nietzsche feared that when the

generality of h um an beings became fully conscious

of

the collapse of

the

foundations

of

their individual and cultural ives, they wo uld lose all zest for

living. This, then,

is

the existential parado x m anifest in the “death

of

G o d ” :

We

live in a world

witlzartt

a goal , purpose , or meaning, but we cann ot live

without a goal , purpose,

or

meaning. In oth er terms, the task Nietzsche sets

himself is to evok e “hope” in a world that is essentially “hopeless,” to say

“yes”

to

lifc in the face

of

the pervasive threat an d inevitable realization

of

“nothingness .”

However elusive their m eaning and wh atever

he

conccptual d i6c ul t ie s

to

wh ich they give rise, Nictzsche intcnds his doctrines

of

“the overman” and

“eternal recurrence” to

be

l i fe-af fkning. Th e overm an m ust eplace God as

the ground

of

meaning and

hope: “The

overman is the meaning

of

the ear th.

Let your will say: the overm an

shall

be the meaning of the earth I beseech

you, my brothers, r e n z a i n j i i t h j i d to t l t e

ear th,

a n d d o

not

bel ieve those who

speak

to you

of

otherwor ld ly

hopes.”3*T h e

overman w ill be

the

o n e

(or

ones) strong e nough to

accept the responsibility

for

legislating values,

a

role

previously assigned to

God.

In

addit ion, the overm an

will

be

s t rong

en o u g h

to

m ak e of the doct r ineof eternal recurrence not an abstract affirmationbut

a

l ived affkmation. The

affirmation

an d experience of eternal rccurrence will

characterize the inn er structu re

of

the overm an’s being3’ W hatever else i t

m igh t connote-and the ran ge and diversity of interpretations suggests that

it connotes

m u c h

more-the doctrine of eternal recurrence was

expevierlced

by Nietzsche as his most radical

aairmat ion of

the wor th

of

life. I would

note only

two features

o f this affirmation. First, against

the

threat of all

escapist eternalisms and narrow em poral hedo nism s, he nsists up on an

eternity that is no t opp ose d

to or

separable f rom t ime b ut

is

the depth of

Each tem po ral m om en t has an eternal depth that lends

to

this life

a

significance denied by the eternalist

a n d

missed

by

the hedonist.34 A second

and perhaps

more

crucial aspect of the doctrine of eternal recurrences that

it

expresses Nictzsche’s

effort

to

refuse to mask-or to hold out any ho pe

for removing-the suffering and terror that are perm ane nt and inevitable

characteristics of life, an d still say a joyful “yes”

to

this life.35 For N ietzsch e,

it is th e belief in eternal recurrence that m akes tolerable, for th os e

who

have



the spiritual strength, an intolerable situation.

I t

does so by testing the ex-

tent to w hich they rcally attirm life. O n ly those w h o can love life w ith

all

its

pain and meaninglessness are tru c lovers of l ife and not escapists into so m e

illusory world.

The rc is perhaps no on e oday who could accept literally Nietzschc’s doc-

trines of theovermanandeternalrecurrence. Nevertheless, anyonc w ho

seriously reflects on the qu estio ns with wh ich hey are concerned ca nn ot, or

a t least o ug ht no t, avoid them-particularly anyone syrnpathctic to th e per-

spective prcsented in this essay. Those dirncnsions

of

human reality so dra-

matically described by Nie tzsch e can no t be avoided in experience, and n o

at tempt should be madc o avoid them in thought.

A M E L IO RA T IO N : YES

SALVATION:

NO

O ve r twen ty years ago , in an essay entitled “T h e American Angle of Vi-

sion,” John J. M cDcrrnot t wrote: “Over agains t the doctr ine of obsoles-

cence in which the h istory of

man

waits patiently for a paradisiacal

Dew ex

macbirza, theAm erican ernpcrpoints

to a

tcmporalizcdeschatology n

which the Sp irit ma nifests itself genc ration by generation and all counts to

the In

a

subsequent scries

of

perceptivcndrovocative cssays,

M cD crrn ott has developed, directly and indirectly, the notion

of

a

“tem-

poralized e ~ c h a t o l o g y . ” ~ ~ncreasingly, his position tends to cxcludc belief

in

God and mm ortal i ty. Since we share so many metaphysicaland epis-

temological assu mp tion s, and since m y ow n reflcctions have been so deeply

influenced by him,

t

is imp or tant tocall attcntion to the divergence between

us on the question

of

Go d and immor ta li ty .

The simplest way to describe the difference might be to say that on this

question McDerrnott’s tilt

is

Deweyan, whcreas

mine

is Jamesian. Whilc an

epistemolog ical agno sticism characterizcs both perspectives,

belief

in

God

and immortal i ty is viewed morc sympathcticaIly by one than

by

the other.

Dewey felt that religious experience-in an y w ay invo lving Go d and

im-

mo rtality, at least-had

for

the

most

part exhausted itself, whilejames to the

end of his life viewed the positive possibilities of reIigious experience as

indispensable for the growth and development of the human communi ty .

Despite the fact that M cD er m ott is on e of the most insightful and imagina-

tive con temp orary interpreters of James, I read h im as increasingly siding

with Dewey

as

regardsreligiousexperience.McDermot tdoesnot abso-

lutely rulc

out

the po ssibility

of

God and imm ortal ity ,

of

course, but he

effectively does so for the purposes of

his

reflective existential lifc.

For

him,

this

belief

is n o long er, in James’s sense, a “livc hypo thesis”: that is, “one

which appeals as a real possibility

to

h i m ” ( W B , 14).

I f

M c D c r m o t t has not

totally excluded belief in God and imm ortal ity f rom

his

reflections, he has

most certainly removed it from the vital centero the periphcry of his reflec-

tive life. In so

doing,

I

think that he has sharpened and deepened the force

and bite

of

his positive insigh ts. This is m os t in evidence in his essay

“The



Inevitability of Our O w n D ea th : The Ce lebra tion

of

Tim e as

a

Prelude to

Disaster” ( S E , 157-68). While Mc D erm ott disavows any “final kno wled ge”

concerning imm ortal ity claims, the tone

of

the essay clearly dim inishes the

seriousness and v iability

of

any and all such claims. We are told that “over-

belief in so m e

form of

salvation

or

immor ta l i ty” is

“a

major way in which

many persons shun the. trauma of death.” Further , “many of us cling t o the

existence of one or m o r e of these solutions, as a redoubt ,

a

t rum p card or

a

last-minute reprieve fro m the ov erw he lmin g evidence that we are terminal”

(SE,

162).

M cD erm ott is underlining hat self-deception which M arx, Nietzsche,

Freud , and others have maintained is at the roo t of a11 belief in God and

immortality.

I

will tou ch up on this

a

bit mo re fully

later,

but the obvious

question

I

will raise then, as I raise it now, is whether this is the whole

story-has the entire ty

of

religious experience been accou nted for by the

revelation that self-deception is perhap s to so m e d eg re e characteristic

of

all

religious experience? First, how ever, I would like to consider a few m o r e

aspects of M cDerrnott’s doctrine in order

to

illuminate

a

hypo thesis that I

consider real and formid able but, as the fun da m enta l thru st

of

this essay

indicates, not fully persuasive.

I

wish to s tress at the outset the extento wh ich share wi th M cDermot t

Jamesian view of th e self, a self wh ich, in M cD errno tt’s wo rds, “is self-

creating

in

i ts ransactions w ith heenv i r onm en t” ( S E ,

45),

andwhich

“risks belief in hy po thes es so as to elicit data unavailable were an agnostic

posit ion ad opted”

( S E , 49).

Where our perspectives diverge is in the scope

of

the “environment” and the range

of

available “data.”

In

the chapters

“James: Full Self and W ider Fields” an d “James: Self and

God,”

I have ar-

gue d, withJam es, the plausibi li ty o f believing that we are con tinuous “w ith

a

wider self f rom wh ichsaving experiences

flow

in”

(PU,

139).

McD er m ot t ,

o n the other hand, with Dewey, “acknowledges no forces at

work, neither

Dionysian nor Divine, other than the constitutive transactionsf hu m an life

w ith the affairs of

nature and the wor ld”S E ,

167).

Both hypotheses presup-

pose experience as transactional, bu t on e suggests a personal transcendent

pole, w hil e the oth er effectively denies it.

The divergence

is

indicated by th c different interpretation or emphasis

that McDerrnot t and 1 would give to the following text ofjarnes:

ifwe survey the field o f history and

ask

what featureall great periods of revival,

of

expansion

of he human mind, display

in

c o m m o n , we

shall

find,

I

think,

simply

this: that each and all of

them

have said

to

the human

being,

“The i n m o s t

nature

of

reality

is

congenial to

powers

which you

possess.” (WB,

73)

McD ermot t comments : “In this text ofJa m es, the fun da m en tal dialectic of

our

situation is laid bare in one trenc han t sen tenc e. Reality has its given ness,

its obduracy, its nature’’

( S E ,

106).

To

which

I

would add : i ts mystery and

mo re enco mp assing dime nsions, wh ich ossibly are manifestations

of

a

cre-



ative principle st rug gli ng

to

incarnate itself and in part dependent upon

s

to

d o

so. I share wi th McD ermot t

his

desire to affirm a h u m a n future that

“doe s not await

some

natural or divine

deus ex machina” (SE,96).

Whcther i t

is possible

to

const ruct

a

Go d-hyp othesis that allows for and indeed necessi-

tates hu m an

effort

w a s the burdenof th e previous chapter. I have repeatedly

maintained that the possibility of any immortali ty bel ief depends o n th e

plausibility of such a God-hypothesis. It is m y symp athy for this hypothesis

that leads me t o & ver ge

from

M c D e r m o t t o n th e m e a n i n g

of

the future,

time , and salvation.

In the late 14 60 s“th e era of the “co untercu lture”-the you ng w ere often

said to fear that they had no futurc. To the extent that this was true, perhap s

the you ng were going proxy for all those

who,

in the wake

of

the searing

modern cr it iques of ph iloso ph y and religion and th e m or e recent disillu-

sio nm en t w ith the saIvific possibilit ies of

scicnce,

feared that hlrmanity had

no future. I t was Nietzsche w ho m os tdramatically explored this possibility,

and McDermott shares with him the effort to say “Yes” to life and to strive

to build a future in the bsence

of

those self-deceptive beliefs up on w hic h an

earlier “sense of the future” depe nded . B oth thinkersesire a

fu ture wi thout

i llusions. In M cD ermo tt’s languag e, “Th e fund am ental qu est ion s wh ether

there is

a

median

way

betw een the self-deception

of

immortal i ty ,

on

the one

hand, a nd the radical co m m itm en t to t he m o m e n t , on he o ther hand”

( S E ,

164).

T h e

task,

as

he sees it, is

to

avoid the “twin pitfalls of the humdrum,

ennui, and boredom , and the equally dehum anizing at tempt to escape the

r hy thm of t ime on behalf of a sterile a n d probably self-deceptive eternal

resolution” ( S E , 168).

Concerning the possibi l ity of

a human

future , the terminality-believer

and he mmo rtality-believerare confrontedwithcontras t ingproblems.

Paradoxically, bo th beliefs threaten to impo verish the present. Term inality

belief threatens the depth of the present by emptying it of any significance

beyond the moment , inasmuch as eventually all dim ens ion s of the m om en t

com e to nothing . Imm ortal i ty belief , on the other hand, tends

to

view the

prese nt as at best

a

mere means, something to be escaped and overcome in

a

fut ure life. Th u s the task of th e terminality-believer is to show that

the

pre-

sent has a l ife and role beyond the m om en t in spite

of

the absence

of

any

absolute or eternal future: hence M cDerm ott’s “temporalized eschatology.”

T he immortal ity-believer, in con trast , m ust sh ow that th e only non ma gical ,

nonescapist fut ure life

is

one

so

organical ly boun d up w ith the present that

the quality o f that life is in pa rt, at least, d ep en de nt on the way in which the

present is lived, the on ly access to

a

significant future being an intensely

lived present

Fromeith er perspective, here is a recognit ion h at hepresent is en-

hanced, deepened, expanded when viewed and lived in relation to

a

future.

Historically, no co m m un ity has ever been energized except insofar as its

members believed

that

their efforts were co ntr ibu ting

to

some

future life,



either

for

them sclves o r thcir hcirs. A serious do ub t can be raised, thcrefore,

that humans-cither individually o r collectively-would co nti nu e to sacri-

fice and struggle

if any and

all

belief in

a

fLlturc life wcrc surrendcred. Prag-

matically sp eak ing, then , therc is n o qucstion

of

thc fruitfulness

of

such

belief. W hat is in que stion is the character of that futurc lifc. Will those

individuals who are a t present striving to build i t participate

i n

it directly

and personally, o r merely indirectly and symb olically?

Inseparably rclated t o the

qucstion of

thc futu re is thc qucstion

of

“tirnc.”

For M cD cr m ot t , “ t im e” m us t

be

rcscucd from both thc classical

perspec-

tive, in w hic h it is but a surface that must

be

penetratcd and cscaped in order

to realize rcfugc in the perrna ncnt, eterna l depth, an d from those co ntem po-

rary pcrspcctives

in

wh ich thc entire significance

of

time

is exhaustcd in the

thin plcasure an d pain of the mo men t . T ime s tands in need of redemption,

but it can

be

rcdeerned, if

a t

all, on ly by hum an eE or t . In one of his more

touching passagcs, McDcrrnott writcs: “I believc that time is sacred. I t

is

not sacred, however, because it has bcen en do w ed by God o r by the Gods,

o r by nature,

o r

by any other extra

o r

intra force. I believe that tim e is sacred

because hu m an histo ry has so endowed i t , wi tho u r suffcrings, our commit-

ments and

with

our anticipations” ( S E , 167). In asserting

its

sacredncss,

M cD erm ot t in no way intends

to

sugarco at the destructivc and dissolving

features of t ime. Living as we do “wi th in the bowels of the temporal pro-

cess,” M cD er m ot t believes “tha t w e sh ould cxperience o ur livcs in thc con-

text of bcing permanently afflicted, that is, of

bcing

terminal” ( S E , 164). H e

here join s

w i t h

a n u m b e r

of

other contcm porary

thinkers

w h o insist that

unless we can accept and to some degre c aff irm thc f inali ty of ou r ow n

dcath, we cann ot ive truly hu m an lives. It is the unde rstandable butencrvat-

ing and somewhat unw or thy fear of death that leads hum ans to believe in

and

hope

for

an

i l lusory immortal i ty . “Time

is

the tooth that gn aw s,”

Dew-

ey tells us. “ I t is the roo t of wh at s som etim es called the instinctive belief in

immortality. Everything perishes but men are unab le t o believe that

perish-

ing is the last word .”38

BothDeweyandMcDertnott recognizedeath as “th e last w ord ,” bu t

neither will accept it as the only wo rd. W hile M cD erm ott insis ts that we

sh ou ld experience ourselves as terminal , he also insists that we can “live

a

creative, prob ing, building life.” It s no t su fic ien t to ay that

we cmz

live this

way ; rather “it is only in this way that

we

can

live

a

distinctively hum an life”

( S E ,

364).

T h e very possibility of growth is stimulated by recognition of

our termina lity, since “hanging back, while waiting to

be

rescued u ltirnate-

ly, from the flow,

will

not generate growth”

( S E ,

166-67).3y I t appears to

me that M cD crr no tt is saying we can live a creative life in spite of death

rather than because of it. Influenced as he

has

been for ma ny years by th e

work of N o r m a n 0 Bro wn ,4o he nevertheless refuscs to jo in in Brown’s

Dionysian death-dance. In M cD erm ott’s jud gm en t, B row n asks us to mar-



r y our ow ndcath” ( S E , 163). UnlikeBrown o r Nietzschc, McDermot t

hopes for a mode

of

l iving availabk to m or c han

a

few isolatcd, idiosyncrat-

ic, and hcroic individuals. In a rclativcly carly essay, hc asks:

How can h u m a n

life,

collectively

unde rs tood ,

sustain such a vision. such

a

Ioncly vigilancc

on behalf

of h u m a n

values,

str ipped of their guarantec

and

lightcd only by thcir h u m a n quali ty?

I

speak

not

of

this pcrson

n o r that person,

not of

Camus, nor

ofWil l ianlJanlcs , nor u f John Lkwcy, nor

o f H a n n a h

Arcndt,

but

rachor ofthosc

who gdthcr

togcthcr

without

such

insight

and livc

in a n d off

t he

“cveryday.”

We canno t ,

after all, in

Buber’s

phrase,

live

o n l y

with

t he

“spasmodic brcakthroughs of

the glowing deeds

of solitary spirits.” ( C E , 64)

in

thc tradit ion ofJames and Dcwcy, M cD erm ott is dcdicated to forging

a

philosophy that isof service not only to thcpecialist bu t in some way to the

widest range of persons possible. H e m us t act o n th e

bclicf

that not just thc

few but the m any can corne to tcrms wi th theabsence

of

salvation and bend

their energies to ameliorat ing the human condit ion. Nictzschc said, “Those

who

cannot

bear the scntcncc, Therc is no salvation, orrgqlrt to pcrish ” 4 ’

While M cD errn ott w ou ld no t accept the harsh “014ght to pcrish,” hc does

imply, as we have seen, that thc surrendc r o f thc hope for alvation is essen-

tial to living

3

distinct ivcly hum an life and contr ibu ting

to

whatever

ame-

lioration of the hum an situation is

possiblc.

I h a w presented M cD crm ott’s view at such length because in additio n to

i ts emerging from the sam e metaphysical assum ptionss

docs rninc,

it

poses

a serious and strong hypo thesis in sha rp conflict on key points with my

own.

T h e

fundamental , and I believe decisive, divergen ce betwe cn us,

as

already ndicated, has to do with the role o f theGod-hypothesis

in

our

respective doctrines. I would l ike to consider a few “sticking points” for me,

but wi thin the f ramework of

he

“existential dialectic,” in the

mode

of ques -

tioning responses rather than alleged refutations.

To

begin with , M cDe rrnott’s assertion

of

“the overw helm ing evidence

that we are terminal” would seem in need of

much

fuller exposition. T ha t

we

arc “termin al” in

some

sense, that we “die ,” is of course

beyond

ques-

t ion. Thedisp utc has todowi thw he the r

we

are ahsdrrtely terminal,

whether “death comes as the end.” M uch depends o n what is

to

count as

evidencc, and herc it would

seem

that reasonable men and wo m en arc divid-

ed.

What seems

to

d r o p o u t

of

M cDerrnott’s picture is that vast amb igu ou s

body of religious ex pcricncc considcred so impor tan t

by

James which is

central to my hyp othesis. At the sam e time, there is no denying-as I have

acknowledgcd f rom the first-that the ov erw he lmin g nu rnb cr of thc mos t

creative thinkcrs and artists in the modern and contemporaryworld seem to

livc

a n d

act within

a

belief framew ork that takes the absolute cessation

of

personal life for granted. But at least at th is moment in human evolution,

there rema in, even in thc West, large

n u m b e r s

of dedicated peoplc-indi-



184

Pevsorlnl I m n r o r t n l i t y : Desirability and E f f i c n c y

viduals voluntarily living with and serving the poor, families adop ting dis-

abled child ren, and the like-who believe that neither their lives n or th e

lives of th ose they serve are exhausted in their m om en tar y existence with in

the

visible world.

Another c la im of M cD erm ot t ’s that I conside r open to qucstion is that

immortality belief is an obstack to g ro w th and creative activity, whereas

terminality belief

is a

st imulus. It would seem that there is n o compell ing

evidence eithe r way. Im m ortality belief does dcenergizc some, becoming an

obstacle to the ir participation in the “building of the ea rth .” Yet the sam e

belief spu rs oth ers o engage in

a

variety

of

modes of creative activity. Here

I

will cite

no

less an autho ri ty than M cD erm ott himself . Some years ago. in

an essay in which

he

argued for the nonobsolescence of

the

Puritan experi-

ence, he stated: “Th e history of Calv inis t doctr inen the hand s of the A mer-

ican P uritans is

a

revealing instance of the t ransmutat ionof theological asser-

t ions for purposes of gr ound ing

a

more extensive society while therc is still

com m i tm en t to the fundamen tal Chr ist ian concern for redemption”

(CE,

77-78). A nd

just

as imm or tali ty belief can lead to engagement or disengage-

me nt with the task of

the human communi ty , so terrninality belief can lead

either to the courageous building

of a

constructive life or to a debilitating

despair or destructive narcissistic hedonism.

In urging us to live creative lives wh ile expe riencing ourselvesas terminal,

M cD erm ot t a lso urges us to ask “for no guarantees and for n o ul timate

signif icance to be at tr ibu ted to our endeavor”

( S E ,

164). This last phrase

would seem to conflate tw o q ui te different questions: that of “guarantees”

and that of “ultim ate significance.” Th ere is n o d o ub t that for many, faith

and hope have been accompanied by claims of cert i tude and guara ntee. I

share wi th McDermot t theamesian view o f belief

or

faith

as

risk-laden and

devoid of any guarantees,

but

w he the r su ch faith necessarily excludes

a

hope

that o u r efForts have ultimate significance is qu ite ano ther qu estion . M cD er-

m ott is no t as clear o n this po int as he mig ht be. Aftcr qucstionin g the

overbelief

of

salvation or immortal i ty , he quickly adds:

I do

not refer here

to a kope

that

somehow,

somewhere, somewhen,

al l will

go

well for all of

us

who are,

have been

or will be. Certainly,

such

a hope is a

legitimate and understandable human aspiration. To convert this hope

into

a

commitment, a knowledge, a conviction, is

to

participate in an illegitimate

move from

possibility

to

actuality.

It

is

understandable

that

we

wish

to

escape

from peril, but it is unacceptable to translate that desire into a belief that

we

have

so

escaped.

( S E ,

162)

I

find this passageperfectlyacceptable nsofar as it

quite

properly dis-

tinguishes

hope

from know ledge and p ossibil i ty

from

actuality. What I do

not understand

is

what the first two sentences mean

for

McDerrnott , given

his

terminality belief. How is itpossible

to

“hope that somehow,

some-

where,

somewhen,

all

will go

well

for

a l l

of

us”

if

one

believcs that each and



every

one

of us

is

destincd for absolute a ~ ~ n i h i l a t i o n ? ~ ~am not , of coursc ,

suggesting that McDerrnott claimscertaintyconcerning ou r annihilation

anymo re than I claim certainty as rcgards o u r salvation.While his view,

then,

does

not

exclude

the abstract possibility

of

hope

for

salvation,

I

a m

questioning the existential cfficacy of such hope w ithin

the

f ramework

of

terminality belief.

Th ere are tw o o ther passages in M cD erm ott’s cssay in which he appears

to me to soften the harsh consequences of his terminality belief. “ Memo-

ries,” he tells us, “save th e loss of places and the loss of persons f ro m total

disappearance” ( S E , 164). But d o they?

For

a time,

of

course, yes-but on ly

(‘for a time,’’ and a very short t ime a t that. If

h u m a n

m em or y is the sole

source

of

protect ion ag ainst “total disappearance,” then the overwhelm ing

num ber of the bil lions of hu m an beings

who

have existed have already and

irrevocably disappeared, and “in time” all huma,nsand all traces of humans

are likely

to disappear as the

cosmos

returns to the preorganic s tate ou t

of

wh ich hum an life

emerged

for its brief, fleeting m om ent-“ trou blin g the

endless

reverie.”

M cD ermo tt c onclu des his essay by citing one of Rilke’s elegies:

.

. .

Just

once,

everything, only

for

once. Once and no more. And we

too,

once.

And

never again. B u t this

having been once, though only once,

having been once o n earth-can

i t

ever be canceIled?d3

To

wh ich M cD errnott respond s: “Inde ed, can it,

we,

ever

be

cancelled? I

think not. Celeb rate” ( S E , 168).

Here

I m ay be missing

some

subt le ty in

both the poet and the p hilosophcr, but

I

cannot resist asking,

w h a t

docs it

mean

to

be terminal if

it

doe s not mean

to

be

canceled?

For

mc,

thc s t rength

of

M cD erm ott’s cssay is its insistent celcbration of

h u m a n

lives i t1

spite o

their inevitable termination

u r d

cancellation.

GOD:

YES

I MMOR TALI TY: NO

A n effort to

show

that the cessation of th e ives of individual persons is both

a

necessary and

a

constructivecharacteristic of reality s ound n the

thought

of

Ch arles Ha rtshorne. “Th e basic reason for mo rtality,” he tells

us,

“is simple and

clear,

in

my

opinion,

and

it

is

aesthetic. Life

is

interesting

because of birth and death, not in spice of them.

. .

T h e y

give life

form,

and witho ut form there s n o satisfaction and no value, I really believe it is as

simple

as that.’y44 Ha rtshorne is neither alone no r particularly original in

comparing individual l ives to works of art

and

finding an unending life as

repug nant nd defective as an unendin g play orMore dis t inct , how-

ever, if not unique, is that H artsh orn e locates ou r individual dramas within

cosmic one. It wo uld seem that for him, only insofar as ou r lives have a

transcendent

reference

can they

be

said

to

have meaning. Hence, he

ofikrs



186 Pcrsorrol Irnntortality:

Desirability

nrld

Eflcncy

the doctr ine of “con tr ibutionism ” as a solut ion to the problem of de ath.

While we can no t, after o u r death, benefit from “hav ing lived well,” there

mu st be supposed som e l ife that does benefit : “O n ly if

we

can believe in

a

superhuman and in

some

strict sense divine form of ife, to w hi ch

o u r

lives

make contr ibutions proport ional to their goodness or beauty, only then is

the permanenc e of our con tr ibutions clcarly irnplicd.” Hartshornc adds hat

“this docs solve the basic question about death, wh ich is how thc meaning

o f life can survive its term ination.”46

I t i s God, then, whosaves ou r lives fro m

to ta l

extinction by receiving the

fruits

of

these l ives an d incorp orat ing them within his ow n. Ha rtshorne

do es not hesitate to refer to G o d

as

“ the Cosmic organism” and to assert

that “ w e are as cells in hedivineorganism.”

I t

fol lows hat“we serve

God

.

. by furnishing prosper ing, happycells to contr ibute

to

his own joy,

to

the aesthetic goodness and richness

of

his life”

(PAT

II:88-89).

In spite of Ha rtsho rnc’s prod igiou s intellectual pow ers, I find it difficult to

avoid a response characterized by bo th rep ug na ncc an d frivolity.

He

softens

the picture somew hat by maintaining that

we

“will serve God, not

as

pup-

pets in his hand s, but as, in hum ble me asure, co-creators w ith Him ” (PAT

II:87). T he b ot to m line, however, is still that wc arc to act in

such

a way as to

m ake

life

interestingand enjoyable or hedivine pectator-participant.

Hartshorne’s view

seems

close to one descr ibed, though not shared,by M i-

guel d e U n a m u n o :

Before

this

terr ible mystery

of

mortality

. . .

man ad opts different a t t itudes

and seeks in various ways to console himself for having been born . And

now

it

occurs to him to take i t as a diversion

and

he says to himself with Renan that this

universe is a spectacle that God presents

to

Himself,

and that

i t

behooves us to

carry out the in ten t ions

f

the great Stage-Manager nd con t r ibu te tomake the

spectacle

the

most

brilliant

and the

most

varied

that

may

be.

( T S L ,

51)

I t is diff icult to understand why we should

be

particularly motivated to put

on a “g oo d show,” even for such

a

distinguished audience. Despite the m a n y

and suggest ive comp arisons between life and a s tage, most of us tend to

believe that “real l ife” e m bo dies a de pth and m ean ing that forbid us to re-

duce it to mere “play-acting.”

In “Immortal i ty and the Modern Ternper” ( P L , 262-81), HansJonas

presents

a

doctr ine of im mo rtali ty s t r ikingly s imi lar to H ar tshorne’s but

more consciously tentat ive and perm eated by

a

m oral rather than aesthetic

overtone . Jonas suggests a metaphysical my th, within wh ich his view on

imm ortal i ty is developed: “In the beginning, for unknow able reasons, the

gro un d of being, or the Divine , cho se to give i tself over to the chance a nd

risk and endless variety of bec om ing .” Jon as insists that the Divine gave

itself withou t rema inder; “on this unco nditional imm anen ce the mo dern

tem pe r insists” ( PL, 275). I t would seem that for Jonas, God has sunk him-

self completely

in

the evolut ionaryprocess; subsequently, its m od e of be ing



Itnmortality: Hope or

Hindrance? 187

will be totally dependcntuponwhatburgeonsforth from thisprocess.

Every stage of the cosm ic process is

a n

instance of “God’s tryin g ou t his

hidden essence and discovering himself thro ug h the surp rises of the world-

adventurc”

( P L ,

276).

W ith thc appearance

of

life, but particu larly

h u m a n

life, we have

“a

hesitant emergenceof transcendence from the opaqueness of

immanence”

( P L ,

275).

A price must be paid, however, for the em ergen ce of indiv idual ife, and

that price is death: “M ortality is the very cond ition of the sepa rate self-

hood .

.

.

so highly prized throug hou t the organ ic wo rld”

(PL,

276).

As

in

Hartshorne’s view, God is the chiefbeneficiary of this mortality,sincc

through births and deaths, sufferings and joy s, love and even cruelty, “th e

Godh ead reconstitutes i tself.” Hen ce, “this s ide of the

good

and evil, G od

cannot ose n he great evolutionary gamc” ( P L ,

277). Are

we hum ans ,

then,

to

have

no

share in the fruits of

o u r

efforts; is human life completely

devoid of any imm ortal ch aracter?t is consequences such as these that Jonas

strives to avoid. Since the indiv idual, in particular the person ,

is

“by nature

temp oral and not eternal,” there is no possibility of personal survival (PL,

278).

Th is is not the wh ole s tory, owever, for Jonas suggests that

s

experi-

ments

of

eternity, we may achieve imm ortal i ty throug h our deed s.“Not the

agen ts, wh ich mu st ever pass, bu t their acts cn ter into

the

becorning

god-

head. . . and in this aw esom e im pact of his deeds on God’s destiny, on the

very complexion of eternal being, lies the im m orta l i ty

of

m a n ” (PL, 274,

277).

47

Jonas dra w s tw o crucial ethical conclusions fro m his metaphy sical my th:

f irst , ou r deeds and how we l ive our lives takes on a “transcendent impor-

tance”; seco nd , through our deeds and our ives “we can nour ish andwe can

starve divinity, w e can perfect an d w e can

disfigure

i ts image”

( P L ,

278).

He nce, “we literally hold in ou r faltering hand s the future

of

the divine

adventure,” for inasmuch as he has “given himself whole to the becoming

world, God

has n o more t o give: it is

man’s

n o w

to

give to him ”

( P L , 281,

279).

A s

to our s take in the future , “al though the hereaf ter is not ours , nor

eternal recurrence of the here, we can have im m orta l i ty at heart wh en in our

brief span

we

serve ou r threaten ed mo rtal affairs and help the suffering im-

mortal God”

( P L , 281).

Th e positions of Ha r t shorne and Jona s a re ak in to that of Whitehead.

Un like hem , however,Whiteheaddoesnotpositivelyexclude hepos-

sibility of personal imm ortali ty-“subject ive immo rtali ty,” in W hitehead-

ian langua ge; the significant similarity is evident in

his

doctr ine

of

“objec-

tive im mo rtality.”

No

doct r ine ofWhitehead’s is easy

to

sum ma rize, but his

view on the ma tter unde r conside ration is som ething like the following .

Reality is best described as a multiplicity of related processes, the basic un its

of wh ich are designated actual entities r actual occasions. Actual entities are

submicroscopic centers of activity, which come

to

be throughacts that are a t

least partially self-creative an d tha t pe rish alm ost instantly, “Perpetual per-



188 Personal Itnnrortdity: Desirnbility u r d Eficacy

ishing,” which characterizes all actual entities with the exception of God, is

not a total perishing.W hile actual entities cease to be as regards their subjec-

tive immediacy, they co nti nu e to be-are “irnrnorta1””insofar

as

they are

appropriated and enter into the consti tut ion

f

new actual entities. T h e relat-

edness that characterizes actual entities is, W hitehead tells us, “ w ho lly co n-

cerned with the appropriat ionof the dead by the living-that is to say, with

‘objective imm orta lity’ wh ereb y wh at is divested of i ts ow n l iving imme-

diacy becomes

a

real component in otherivingmmediacies of

be-

coming.”4*

In the concluding chapter o f Process urd Reality W hitehead at tempts

to

show that “ the object ive immo rtali ty of actual occasions requires th e pri-

mordial permanence

of

G o d ”

( P R ,

527).

h

so

doing , he is endcavoring,

perhaps, to give

a

me taphysical justification

for

a rather s trong claim h e

made a few years earlier (1925): “T he fact of the religious vision, and its

history o f persistentexpansion, is o u r one ground for op t imism. Apar t

from it , hu m an life is a flash of occasional enjoyments lighting up a mass

of

pain and misery,

a

bagatelle

of

t r a n s i e n t e ~ p e r i e n c e . ” ~ ~n the later work,

Whitehead nsists hat “objective im m or tali ty w ith in the temporal wor ld

does .n ot solve the problem set by the penetration

of

the finer religious in-

tention. ‘Everlastingness’ has been lost; and ‘everlastingncss’ is the co nte nt

of that vision upon which the finer religions are built” ( P R , 527).

Whitehead goes on in

a

series of what might becalled dialectical para dox -

es

to afflrm essential interdependence and interpenetration (bu t n ot iden tity)

between

God

and the wor ld . All tem poral occas ions em bo dy G od and are

em bo died in Go d. “Each actuality has its present life and its im m ed iate pas-

sage int o novelty; bu t its passage is no t its death. This final phase of passage

in

God’s

nature is ever enlarging itself. . . . Each actuaIity in the tem po ral

world has its recep tion into

God’s

nature”

( P R ,

528-31).

W hat remains un-

clear, however, is whether the unique individuality characterizing those

so-

cieties

of

actualentities called “persons,” has its“reception nto

God’s

nature.’’

F r o mm y perspective, thephilosophies of immortality expressedby

Har tshorne,

Jonas, and

Whitehead realize

a number of admirable

insights,

some version of whichmus t bc included in anyreasonablysatisfactory

model of immortal i ty .To begin with, they present an immortality ar supc-

rior to

and

hum anly r icher than th e

one

so

beloved

of

the

Greeks

and still

so

prevalent, f on ly implicitly, n th e co nt em po ra ry world-namely, fame-

i r n m ~ r t a l i t y , ~ ~hose l imitat ions and moral shortcomings have becom e in-

creasingly evident to reflective persons, however strong thc desire for

fame

may

cont inue to be in mostchievers. “HOW oon they forget” might be the

lament of all but a very

few

of the billions w h o have pop ulated the earth.

Further, with the en d

f

the earth and

he

hu m an racc a distinct possibility, if

no t ce rtainty, it becom es incrcasingly likely that in

the

lon g run we will all

be forgotten.

We

need not,

however,

project

so

far

ahead

to

recognize the



moral inadequacy

of

any imm ortal ity through fame. I t too often happens

that those w ho m igh twell be deem ed wo rthyof fam e pass unn oticed, wh ile

the

more

reprehen sible achieve a fam e that keeps th em in the min ds of pos-

terity: given

a

fame-immortality perspective, as Jonas lam ents, “the Hitlers

and the Stalins o f o u r ra wo uld have succeeded to extract im m orta l i ty from

the extinction

of

their nameless victims’’ (PL,

265).

Anothermer i t of he kind of mm ortal itysugges tedby these hree

thinkers is that it imm easu rab ly enh anc es the significance of human acts ,

individual and collective. Pragmatically speaking, an account of human ac-

tions that sees them 2s not only having an intrinsic me aning but also con-

t r ibut ing to the enr ichment anddvance

of an eternal process is far sup erior

to t he m any m odes

of

w hat m igh t

be

called passive Platonism: that is, supe-

rior to an y view that posits essences, values,

or

form s as eternally com plete

and ully realized, the reb y est rict inghum an action to mere imitation.

Som ething close to such “passive Plato nism ” is conveyed,

I

believe, by San-

tayana:

“ H e

w h o lives in th e ideal an d leaves it expressed i n society o r in art

enjoys

a

double immortal i ty . The eternal has absorb ed him while he lived,

and when he is dead h is in fluencc br ings o thers to the same a b ~ o r p t i o n . ’ ’ ~ ~

Finally, Hartsho rne, Jonas, and W hitehead , ach in a somewhat dis t inct ive

fashion, have madeormidable efforts

to

be faithful

to

that radical

imm anen tism wh ich has been

s o wide ly and diversely advanced by con tem-

porary thinkers . A t the same t ime hey have striven to avoid the sm oth erin g

and suffocating character o f suc h im m ane ntism , w hich too ofte n can give

rise to

the fecling

of

being locked in

a

cosmic madhouse. Jonas,after notin g

the reality and pervasiveness

of

t ime, adds: “An d yet-we feel, tem po rality

cannot

be

the wh ole story, because in man it

has

an inherently self-surpass-

ing quality, of which the very fact and fumbling

of ou r idea of eternity is a

cryptic signal”

( P L ,

268).

I t may well be that forsome t im e to

come,

th e best that reflective thinke rs

can

do is

call at tention to the “cryp tic s ign al”

r

the “ rumor

of

angels,” T h e

efforts o f the Hartsho rnes, Jonascs, Whitehe ads, and their l ike to affirm an

eternal,

a

transcendent, a G od that does no t serve as a refuge or an escape

from the scratchings an d sufferings of human agents, are as needed as they

are 1ikeIy to fall short . Whatever the shortcom ings of such at temp ts from

thk poin t of

view of systematic conce ptualization, their d irection, I feel con-

fident, is the one that offers th e m os t hop e an d the richest possibilit ies for

both the deepening and expansion of o u r present life and the contribution

toward significant hu m an life in th e fu ture. The m od est criticisms and ten-

tative proposa ls that follow are to a great extent but

a

variation and a gloss

o n the ideas o f such thinkers.

It is important

to

stress that while n o pretense is m ade of anything ap-

proaching

“proof’

o r refutation, there

is a

necessity for a t least attempting

to

move beyond any sent imental pos ture w hich ho lds that both thernrnor-

tality belief and its cou nterb elief can

be

reconciled w ith neither pain nor



190

P e rs o na l I m m o r t a l i t y

:

D e s i r a b i l i t y at id E icncy

loss. Nevertheless, as already noted, we are obliged to listen to these and

other counterclaims and their accompanying arguments with an “existential

ear.” A pragmatist, while not excused from attending to the signs of argu-

ment and the need for systematic conceptualization, must continually re-

main sensitive to those lived liabilities and possibilities that ever elude argu-

ment and conceptualization. Finally, the need for continuing critical evalua-

tion does not exclude the necessity for a simultaneous commitment. Evalua-

tion and commitment experiments must persist in an unending dialectical

relation that excludes both j n a l evaluation and

closed

commitment.

My chief objection to the views of Hartshorne, Jonas, and the dominant

version of Whitehead is that within their perspectives the priority and cen-

trality of the individual person tends to become subordinated to some high-

er value.52 I have already suggested that the gain or loss in relation to im-

mortality is directly proportional to the worth of the individual person and

that no surrogates can serve to alleviate the pain of loss. It seems quite well

established that belief in some kind of immortality preceded both belief in

a

personal God and belief in the unique value of the individual person. But as

John Hick notes, “what is important is the fact that the idea of a desirable

immortality, as distinguished from that of an undesired because pointless

and joyless survival [for example, in the Greek Hades or the Hebrew Sheol],

arose with the emergence of individual self-consciousness and as

a

correlate

of faith in

a

higher reality which was the source of value.” Hence, “the belief

in a desirable immortality depends, logically and historically, upon the no-

tion of

value

both

of

the human individual and in a higher reality which is

superior even to the power of death.”53 O f course, it does not follow that the

reverse is true-that the value of the person depends upon immortality-

but that is not my claim. What I am contending is, first, that there was and

is a reasonableness in relating immortality to the value of such realities as

human persons; and second and more evidently, that the annihilation of such

valuable entities involves

a

profound and irreparable loss.

‘‘Person

signifies,” according to Aquinas, “what is most perfect in all

nature-that is, a subsistent individual of a rational nature.”54 Whatever the

shifts in the meaning and metaphysics of persons, it is safe to say that, if

anything, the value of persons has increased in the contemporary world. An

eminently supportable claim and a decent argument might be made to the

effect that individual persons are, among all the realities of our experience,

the most valuable. Without here attempting to prove that claim, let me sim-

ply assert that in theory and intent, if not in practice, persons are so re-

garded. To illustrate this assertion, let

us

imagine the following situation:

I

am in a room occupied also by the most precious art object ever produced

and

a

child. There ensues a fire such that

I

have the time and the ability to

save either the art object or the child. Would not the overwhelming number

of human beings in such a situation-learned or no-make the painful

choice to save the



ltnmortnlity: Hope or Hindratice?

191

The person as supreme value might be and has been challenged by those

who make that claim for eternal or timeless or absolute values. Wherever

one comes down on this long-standing dispute concerning the nature, pos-

sibility, and reality of such values,

I

think most would agree that many

human beings have lived lives rich in consequence both for themselves and

others in the light or pursuit of “truth,” “goodness,” “justice,” and the like.

It may be that these values have

a

reality in themselves apart from human

experience, but surely the most compelling evidence for believing that they

are in any way “real” is found in the lives of individual persons who believe

in them. Further, apart from their incarnation in individuals and commu-

nities, these values are always in danger of becoming empty and lifeless

abstractions. Finally, even granting the supremacy of “timeless values,” the

human person takes on a very high value in virtue of the ability to grasp,

share in, or live by such values.

If individual death, as in Hegel, serves the universal or absolute Spirit, or,

as in Hartshorne and Jonas, serves the development and enrichment of di-

vine life, then there is a meaning to individual lives and a

propriety to their

cessation. Such perspectives, however, cannot avoid reducing human beings

to

the status of a “means,” thus placing these perspectives in opposition to

the principle advanced by others, most notably Kant, that a human being

may never be used as

a

means but must always be regarded and treated as an

“end-in-itself.” There is no dispute concerning the unacceptability of any

individual’s or group’s use of other individuals and groups as a means to an

end from which those

so

used are excluded. When the user becomes Nature,

or Spirit, or God, or Mankind, the issue is less clear and the consensus less

than total; nevertheless,

I

would insist that using humans, whether indi-

vidually or collectively, as

a

“means” to some end or life outside themselves

is just as repugnant in the latter instance as in the former. John Hick quite

forcefully rejects both religious and humanistic justification for human suf-

fering. Religious justification is exemplified in St. Paul’s text: “Will what is

moulded say to its moulder, ‘why have you made me thus?’ Has the potter

no right over the clay?”56 The humanistic justification posits “a more real

humanity or superhumanity in the future which will have evolved out of the

painful process of human life as we know it.” Hick finds both unacceptable

because “they imply

a

view of the individual human personality not only

as

expendable in the sense that he can be allowed to pass out of existence but,

more importantly, as exploitable in the sense that he can be subjected to any

extent and degree of physical pain and mental suffering for a future end in

which he cannot participate and of which he knows nothing” (DEL, 158-

Assuming, then, that human persons are precious, if not the most pre-

cious, realizations of nature or the cosmic process, the failure to maintain

these persons in that mode upon which their preciousness depends can hard-

ly be viewed as grounds for celebration. At the same time,

I

do not believe it

59).



I92

Persotla1 Immortality:esirability

arid

EJcacy

possible

to

argue from the value of human individuals to the rational neces-

si ty of their immortal i ty.

n his Ingersoll Lecture, Ju lius Seelyc Bixler m ad e

a simp le but telling point against such an argume nt: “If the universe is ra-

tional o r ju st, they say, it can no t ruth lessly stam p ou t its fairest prod uct,

personal life. The arg um en t is no t convincing, however, because w e kn ow

so little of wh at rationality as applied to th e universe can be”

( P M , 30).

Bixler, of course,

is

still presu pp osin g that some m od e of at ionality belongs

to the universe. In the wak e

of

powerful Nietzschean and existentialist

cri-

tiques, however, the possibility o f an “absu rd” rather than “rational” uni-

verse cannot be ruled out. The se critiques have rendered questionable, at

least, all claims conc erning “rationality.” While it is not possible to “prove”

that we l ive in an absurd wo rld any mo re than wean “prove” that we live in

a rational one, still the specter of abs urd ity hov ers over and touches all our

undertaking^.^'

Another effort

to

establish the rationality of immortality has been based

on the evo lutionary process. The argument here is that since human beings

are the highe st specim ens produ ced by the long evolution ary process, t

wo uld be irrational

for

this process now

to

allow its finest achievem ents to

com pletely d isappear. Corliss L arnon t justifiably criticizes those advancing

this argument, noting that

at

one t ime the dinosaurs “were the highes t

orm

of terrestrial l ife” and, had they been capable

of

thou ght , wo uld have mad e

the same claims as does the imrno rtalist 11,

185).Of

course, we can never be

certain that we are n ot grist for the e volutiona ry mills ju st as previous

spe-

cies have b een, and henc e fated for the sam e extinction. As already indi-

cated, however, immor ta l i ty is

a

ques t ion notof certa inty bu t of credibility,

and the credibilityo f im m or t a l i t ys int imately bound up wi th anotherues-

t ion of credibili ty: namely, whether we can believe with som e deg ree of

just if icat ion that th ro ug h the evolutionary process there has em erged

a

spe-

cies whose individua ls have the possibility of achieving

a

distinct, personal

relation to the divine.

Even

if

we admi t God in to the p ic ture , theres no obvious rational neces-

sity for personal immortality,as the wr i t ings of Har t shorne and Jonasllus-

trate. There is, however, an im po rta nt difference

in

the nature and quality

of

ref lective inquiry w hen a shif t s ma de from an imp ersona l naturer cosmic

process

to

a

personal,oving A s a m i n i m u m , such ahiftends a

certain poignancy

to

the situation. Let

us

presuppose a God w h o is existen-

tially related

to

human persons such that we can speak of this relation as an

essential constituento fh u m a npe rson ho od . Further, et us posit with

Whitehead

a

divine activity characterized b y “ a tende r care that nothing be

lost . .

.

a

tenderne ss which loses noth ing that can be saved” (PR,525). As-

suming, w i th Har tshorne, Jonas , a n d mo st W hitehead ians, that individual

persons are not

among

that which “can be saved”

and

hence must, in spite

of God’s “ tender care ,” be judged los t , what fol lows? Surely sadness , not

only hum an but ,

more

imp ortant , d ivine.5y Gran ting hat

n o

simp le idenci-



ty can be made between hum an and divineove, it is still hard if not impos-

sible

to imagine the character

f a

personal love in wh ich on eof th e partici-

pants in the relationship was not sorely grieved by the loss of the other.

It may

well

be,

as

some

serious and formida ble thinkers assure

us,

that

keeping us in mind is the very best Go d can do, bu t that can hardly be said

to be something

for

us t o l ook f o r w ar d t o . j u s t s it is good

for

hum ans t o

rem em ber loved

ones,

so i t may be go od for G od to

do

so, but in neither

case-if tha t is all there is-can i t bc said to bc good for the Ioved ones.

Here

one

must agree with Epicurus and Lucret ius that the nonexistent can be

neither harmed nor benefited. I f i t ma kes sense

to

say that for human beings

it is imm easurably better to sustain loved one s in reality rather than me rely

in memory , why

does

i t no t m ak e sense

to

say

the

same

abou t G od ,

even

if

we mu st reluctantly conclude that he possesses

no

m or e such power than

we,

beyond

a certain point?

No wh ere, perha ps, is theeffort to give ndividu al lives some meaning

beyond the fleeting moment m or e touchingly portrayed than when Hans

jonas discusses “the gassed andburntchi ldren

of

Auschwitz”and he

“numb erless v ictims of the other man-made holocausts of our t imc.” For-

bidden by his principles

to

accord the m personal im m ortality , Jonas nev-

ertheless refuses to bclicve that heyare“debarredfrom

an

immortal i ty

wh ich even their torm en tors and m urd erer s ob tain ecause they could

act-

abom inably, yet accou ntably, thu s leaving their sinister

mark

on eternity’s

face.” Instead, he asks,

“should

we not bel ieve that the immense chorus of

such cries that has risen u p in

our

lifetime now han gs over o u r w or ld as

a

dark and accusing

cloud?

That e terni ty looks d o w n

upon us

with a f rown,

wounded and per turbed in its dep ths?” Jon as will say no m or e than that it

would

be

f i t t ing if , on th e account of the slaughtered,

“a

great effort w ere

asked

of

those alive to l if t the sha do w from

ur

br ow andgain

for

tho se after

us

a new chance of serenity by restoring i t o th e nvisible wo rld” ( P L , 279-

80).

When confronted wi thevil of the magni tude of that manifest in theHolo-

caust an d allied ho rro rs, he on ly relatively app ropr iatehumanresponse

would seem

to

be silerlce-a “silence” no t on ly in the W ittgensteinian sense,

which is due to thc ack of any language adequate to such events, but more

imp ortant , in the ense of wh at mig ht be alled a “silence

of the

spirit.” This

lat ter mo de

of

silence brings

us

as

close as possible to an experience

of

the

unexperienceable abyss of nothing ness; i t is an evoca tion o f that radical

emptiness which accompan ies not a11 experiences of death but all experi-

ences of the death of

a

beloved wh ose being

had

been jo ined wi th our own in

a

m o de of metaphysical int imacy. Against the background of such silence,

a l l explanations or accounts of the me aning

of

death have a character of

superficiality and triviality. Yet silence ca nn ot be the total and exhaustive

response, as has

been

evidenced from the d a w n

of

civilization in the plethora

of

religious rites, sy m bo ls, p ractices, philosoph ical explana tions, biological



justifications,nditcrary and artis tic Yet while wc must

speak, we must do so against

a

ba ck gr ou nd of silence such that we never

cease to be aware of the radical inadequacy o f o ur anguagc.

BELIEF

IN I M M O R T A L I T Y :

ESSENTIAL O R DISPENSABLE

FOR C HR I S TI ANI TY?

Belief in imm orta lity is n ot insep arablc from religion in

gcncral . Thc

East-

ern religions, for the m ost part, hold no imm ortal ity doctr incs ,

though

I

find sugge stive the persistence o f reincarnation as

a

belief in all segments-

learned and unlearned-of Eastern religious com m un ities, inclu din g tho se

accepting non theistic forms

of

B ud dh ism . In spite of th e differences-and

they are num erous, subtle, and mpo rtant-among doctr ines

of

imrnor-

tality, resurrc ction , and reincarna tion, all seem

to

reject th e tota l annihila-

tion

of

whatevcr is understood as m y “authentic” o r “true” self.

When we turn to the Western mo de of eligion, in particular C hristianity,

there can be little d o u b t that belief in personal survival has been a central

characteristic. A s James pointed out, “religion, n fact, for the great m ajority

of our race means imm ortal i ty, and nothin g else. G od is the prod ucer of

immortal i ty ; and whoeverhas dou bts

of

imm ortal i ty is wri t ten down as an

atheist”

( V R E ,

412).

John He rma n Randall,

Jr. ,

maintains that belief in per-

sonal survival was the f irst of “th e

old

religious doctr ines” to bec om e a

casualty of the cr i t iques s temm ing f rom the adv ent of mod ern science. H e

quickly adds, however, that “immortal i ty was a far m or e vital belief than

that in

God”

and that “the re persisted

a

deep yearnin g for imm ortality, even

if vicarious”-a yearning by no means confined to the unsophist icated and

the conservative, though the immortal i ty of theace often replaced im m or -

tality

of

the person: ‘‘In giving

up

i t s hope of personal survival, religious

faith,

even

of the m od ern ists a nd iberals, had staked everything o n the

im-

mortality

of

ma nkind . Eve n eighteen th-century materialism had assumed

the permanence o f t h e universe as it is, and with the prom ise f an unlimited

social

progress” PAD, 19).

That immortal i ty

or

resurrection-belief has been

a

ccntral and significant

feature of W estern religion is one thing; wh ether itmurt and

s h o d

cont inue

to be s o is, of course, qui te a

different

matter. Unamuno’s response is

un-

equivocal: “Once again

I

m ust repeat that the longin gfor the im m orta lity of

the soul , for the permanence, in some form

or

another , o f ourpersonal and

individual consciousness, is as much o f the essence of religion as is the long-

ing that there may be a

G o d ”

(TSL , 221). Bu t Un am uno ’s voice is by n o

means representative

of

contemporary thinkers . Many, though sympathet ic

to religion, contend that it can be purified only by surrendering any andall

belief in imm orta lity. Bixler, for example, insists that “the religious require-

ment that life

be

ma de wo rth wh ile, and that values be achieved for their

own sake,

has

a11 the more force when the

hope

for

a

final adjustment is

removed” ( I P M ,

40).

61



A rnorc formidab lc obstacle for the Ch ris t ian wh o wishes to retain a be-

lief in some m o d e of personal survival is the argumen t “that the C hris tian

hope of resurrection is

. .

misinterpreted as survival of death.” T h e con-

tem po rary theological scholar Jose ph Ble nk inso pp advances this v iew po int

in

a

sensitivc

essay

in which he endeavors, by means of a hermeneutical

effort,

“ to

get inside traditional (and this, o fc o u rs c , includes biblical) state-

me nts abou t resurrection and ife after death in ord er to gra sp thexpericncc

and the immediacy from which they spr ing and

to

discover w hether such

experience is still available to m od ern m an , w heth er i t an speak to his expe-

rience of himself and the world in which

he

lives” (ZR, 16). Without going

into thedetails of his argu m en t, let me cite Blenkinsopp’s conclusion, which

to

m y

nonhermcneutical eye

does

not

follow

from the biblical evidence

presented.

W hile we will rccognizc t hc po pu Iar idea

of

the resurrcction-a

new

body

waiting for us “on the oth cr side” l ike a new sui t ready

o

pu t on-as a rather

ridicuIo us ca ricature, it is still difficult even for a sophisticated Wcstern Chris-

tian to t h ink o f

i t

i n anything but ndividualistic erms. Hence t must

b c

stressed that the resurrection of the dead is

not

the guarantee of personal sur-

vival after death. If we wish to remain faithful to t h c biblical test imony, we

must no t

separate

the

destiny

of

thc individual

from

that

of

t he communi ty -

the body of Christ-and of the entire creatcd order, T h e resurrect ion of the

body exprcsses prim arily and essentially the destiny o f th c new communi ty ,

the eucharistic body, the

body of

the r isen Christ , which is the nucleus of a

world-widc communi ty . (ZR, 25-26)

I am aware that hermeneutical theology strives to relate the carlicr cxperi-

ence and articulations of the Ch ris t ian com mu nity to present-day lifc. I t

does not t ry o describe the psychological consciousness o f earlier Christians

bu t to uncover throug h subtle reading

of

received texts the still vital core

of

lived expe rience and mean ing-structure. I admire wi thout c la iming to fully

understandBlenkinsopp’shcrn~eneutical efforr.Nev crthcless, he csults

raise a n u m b er of questions.

My initial reaction to the passage qu ote d above was, “W hat in heaven’s

name could he possibly

be

trying to say?”

To

which

it

might

bc

replied,

“You’ll f ind out only wh en and if you get to heavcn.” But s ince such a

heavenly destiny

seems

very unlikely on Blenkinsopp’s terms,

it

is nccessary

to

make

a few

m u n d a n e

comments.

To

begin

w ith , if, in calling the idea

of

a

new body awaiting

us

like

a

new suit of clothcs

a

caricature, Ble nk inso pp is

cautioning

against

any at tempt

to

picture

the

rcsurrcction, thcn

there

can be

little dispute. His criticism appears m uch strongcr, how ever; hc states that

“the Christian

hope

of resurrection is

aIso

often misinterpreted as survival

of death”

( I R ,

119). Now thcrc is no difficulty in unders tanding this-

though there may be in accepting it-if Ble nkin sop p me ans tha t death ter-

minates our personal cxistcnce and hence any “h op e o f resurrection” mu st

pertain to

a “here

and now” existential t ransformation. Such

a

reading,



however,

is

no t easy t o reconcile with ano ther passage that rcfers to “deter-

mining the precise form of the Christian hope for

l i f e

u j e r death” ( I R , 116;

italics added).

Blenkinsopp stresses “that the resurrection

of

the dead is

not

the guarantec

ofpersonalsurvivalafterdcath.” N o te that the tern1 “n ot” rather han

“guarantee” is i talicized. Were it the oth er way a round , we m ight conc lude

that w hat is being rejected, quite properly, is any effort to “prove” that we

survive, using

such

belief as a hedge against the terrors of life. Such

a

view

would not only be s imilar to the one advanced earlier in this cssay but also

con cur w ith Blenkinsopp’s previous statement: “To speak in term s of

a

ra-

tional certitude threatens to void of meaning b oth death and the C hris tian

promise

of

new life from death.” But Blenkinsopp would not seem to

be

stressing the

fai th

character

of

the resurrection. Instead, he appears to be

deny ing “p ersonal su rvival” w hile affirming “new ife

from

dea th.” Perhaps

the apparent conflict between these assages is overco me through the notion

that “thc resurrection o f the b od y expresses primarily and essentially the

destiny

of

t he new com m uni ty”? I R , 119,

126).

As we saw abov e, Blenkin-

sop p insis ts that “w e must not separate thc dest iny of the individual from

that of the co m m un ity” an d he furth er dentifies this “ncw com m uni ty” as

“the eucharis t ic body, the body

f

the risen Ch rist, w hic h s the nucleus

of

a

world-wide communi ty .” Two simple questions, which are really one

ques-

t ion, must be asked con cerning this new com mu nity. First, granted that it is

imp rop er to “separate the destiny

of

the individual fr om that of the cornmu-

nity,” is i t permissible toeparate the des tiny

of

the conm umity f rom hat

of

theecond,oes (or can)his newommuni tynclud e as con-

st i tuent members those individual persons,past and present, w h o have been

invited to jo in in and w h o have worked for its corning?63

M y final quest ionconcerning Blenkinsopp’sprovocativearticle is far

from simple.

I t

requires, indeed,

a

digression in the form of an apology.

Any effort

of

religious reconstruction has the dif iculc task

of showing

h o w

interpretations of Christ ianity great ly influenced by mo dern thoug ht and

experience maintain significant co ntin uit y w ith the earlier faith experiences

of the comm uni ty . Those w ho under take such a task dare not overlook the

possibility that they may con tribute to the dem ise

of the

very communi ty

they strive to serve. At best, an interpretation that diverges from the dom i-

nant mode

of

understanding-as,

for

example, that

God

is changing-will

have a entative, hy po the tica l characterand must

be

submit ted o ong-

range testing through reflection and action. The re are two prem ature and

immature responses

to

such innov ative interpretations: unq uestioning ac-

ceptance and unhesitating rejection.

And so, to

m y

final

question: Does not any interpretation of resurrection

belief that excludes the possibility of s o m e m o d e of personal postdeath par-

ticipation in the divin e life radically unde rm ine the justificatio nfor the con-

tinued existence

of

this belief?



i mmo r t n l i t y :

Hope or

Hindvatlce? 197

Let us assum e that theolog y will increasingly hold, with Blenkinsopp,

that to believe in personal survival o f death is to misinterpret the doctrine o f

resurrection. I believe it can be sh ow n hat belief in persona l resurrection has

played

a

role

in the life

of

the Chr is tian comm uni ty comparable

to

and

inseparable from God belief. Not only have the overwhelm ing numb er of

Christians in all stations of l ife, and from the earliest mo m en ts of the com-

m un ity life, believed that so m e m od e

of

personal survival is emb odied in the

divine promise

of

eternal life, but it has inspired and energized liturgy and

ritual, poetry and painting , philoso phy and theo logy, med itat ion and prac-

tice.““ I am not rul ing out , a priori , a case for continued allegiance

to

Chris -

tian tradition in the absence

of

belief in personal im m or tali ty or personal

resurrection, but that

case

has

not yet been made. Nor do see what Chr is -

tianity devoid o f such

belief

is

able

to achieve or contribute that cannot be

realized on otherfaith grounds, grou nds mu ch ess problematic and burden-

some than those

of

Christianity.

T h e pragmatic perspective honorsno digerence in ideas o r ideals that does

not make

a

difference in experience. With reference to religious faith, James

has stated the issuc succinctly:

The

whole defense

of

religious faith hinges

upon

action.

I f

the action required

or

inspired by the religious hypothesis s in no way different from that dictated

by the

naturalistic hypothesis, then religious faith spure superfluity, better

pruned away, and controversy about its legitimacy

is a

piece of idle trifling,

unworthy

of

serious minds. ( W B , 32)

T h is raises a com plicated issue. Reflective Christian s, it seem s

to

me, m us t

ask themselves and each other wh eth er the existence

and

continuance of

Christianity makes a differencc. Sup pose wh atever s of vaiue in Ch ristianity

can

be

envisioned or realized by other means.

I t

mig ht the n m ake sense

to

maintain mem bership in this venerable com mu nity for psyc holog ical and

sociological easons, bu t he necessity nd eriousness

of

membersh ip

would be immeasurably diminished.

Let us pose the quest ion of whether C hr is tiani ty makes

a

difference in

terms of a belief in G o d to the exclusion o f personal survival

of

death. Una-

muno

recounts

an

incident in which he

proposed

to

a

peasant “the

hypothesis

that there might indeed be a G o d w h o governs heaven and ear th , a C o n -

sciousness

of

the Universe , but

or

all that the

soul

of every man may no t be

imm ortal in

the

traditional and concrete sense. He replied: ‘Then wherefore

God?’

” (TSL,

5). Near the conclusion of his

Trugir

Sense

OfL-if,

U n a m u n o

addresses himself

direct ly and dramatical ly

o

the relation between God and

immortal i ty : “We d o n o tneed G od in ord er hat he may teach us the t ru thof

things, or the beauty

of

them, or

in

order that he may safeguard morali ty y a

system of penalties

and

punishments .

but

in order that He may save us, in

order thatHe may no t let us die utterly” (TSL,

319).65

Now

w hil e it is ev ident that

a God

wh o doe s “no t le t

us

die utterly”



rnakcs

a

diffcrencc, it docs not follow that this is the only kind of

God

who

would make

a

diffcrencc.

I t

might be suggested that belicf in God and sym-

bolic resurrection directs and energizes us toward personal transformation

and self-realization, to ward

a

respectandconcernfor ou r fellow

h u m a n

beings, oward

a

removal

of

the ineq uities an d injusticcs hatplague he

world,

and

toward a new com mu ni ty in which love would

be

the deterrnin-

ing and controlling quality. All these goals and others that mig ht be mcn-

t ioned are em inently wo rthwh ile, but wh at s not evident is that these goals

need God, m uc h less symbo lic resurrect ion, for either their conception or

their realization. Even if it could b e sho w n that historically they all entered

human consciousness within a religious contex t, i t does not ollow that they

can now be pursued

m l y

within such

a

contex t. Indeed , thesegoalsand

values arc affirmed by m any enlig hten ed secular humanists.

If , thcn, herc

is n o

exp erien tial diEerence-either inactuality o r pos-

sibility-betwecn a n enlightcncd thcist and an cnlightened atheist, the prag-

matist insists hat

there

is no significantdifference. T h e conscquence, as

James no ted , is that the “religious faith

is

pu re superfluity, better pru ne d

away.”

I

suggest that a Christianity crnptied o f any vital belief in the

pos-

sibility of some rnodc

of

personal survival is irrelevant

a t

best, and obstruc-

tive and burdcnsorne

a t

wo rst . Ap plying a vcrsion

of

thc principle

of

par-

s imony,

the

contcnt ion is that the enorm ous bagg age belon ging to religion

in general and Christianity in part icular should n ot continue

to

be carried

if

what it a t tempts to

affirm

and realize can be achieved more simpIy.

I f

funda-

mentally the sa m c values can bc realized through the faithof secular human-

ism, then the mon umen tal energies employed to sus tain Chr is t ianity are

crimina1Iy wasted.

Think, for example, of thc dedicat ion andffort

of

thosc theologians striv-

ing to intcrpret and pur i fy and develop Chr is t ian doctr ine.f the goal

of

their

efforts is no t dig cren tfrom that

of

the humanis t , s i t no t a gravc misdirection

of human energy, when therc areo many concre tc human problcmshat cry

out for attention and imaginative rcsponse?t m ig ht be lcgitirnate to cont inue

to s tudy theeligious experienceof hu m an kin d, past and present , in order to

distill fro m it insigh ts fo r incorpo ration into thcffort to allcviatc the human

condit ion. But the maintenance ofrel igious inst i tut ions and the theologicals

well as personal dcfenseof

the

beliefs and practices of religious communi t ies

would

secm

to be both unduly burdensome and point lessf thc best fruits

of

such efforts can be oth erw ise achievcd. T h e negative features o f religions,

including Christianity, are well known and well documented . T h e record

of

religion, past and present, discloses inhurnanitics ran gin g from th e pett y to

the petr ifying. Th c con t inuing s t ruggle to overcome the debil i tat ing and

dehumanizing characteristics of religion through thepurification

of

religious

experience a nd

the

t ransformat ion of i ts forms and inst i tut ionscan be justi-

fied only if a t least so m e positive possibilities w ith which religion is con-

cerned ar e available

in

no

other

way.



One such possibility would be expressed in the bclicf that we are here urd

rrow participating in

a

proccss more encom pass ing than what

is

ovdinavily

available to consciousness an d on e in wh ich we can hope for a cont inuing

participation

in

a

new

life.

Suc h

belief m igh t

give

hu m an life

a

depth ,

scope,

and vitality w hich , wh ile no t n conflict with the cst fcaturcs of hu m an ism ,

wou ld nevertheless be significantly different.

IMMORTALITY:

H O P E

O R

H I N D R A N C E ?

I t is evidcnt that m y rcsponsc

to

thc tit lc questionof this chapter

is

“both .”

1

have already suggested and w ill continue to su gg es t that the need is for an

existential dialectic w hc reb y im m ort ali tybelicf engenders and

decpens

hope

withou t m asking thosc aspects

of

such

belief that hindcr

responsible

living.

Aspects of hindrance are inevitably and existentially intertw ined with the

hopc to w hic h bclicf in personal im m orta l i ty gives rise, and these hindering

elements must

bc

continually and honestly faced, and efforts made to lessen

i fn o t complctciy eradicatc them. I want to stress, however, that

a

mixture of

hopeful

and hindering aspects in relation

to

the meaning

of

hu m an life is

not

a characteristic on l y

of

tho sc w ho belicvc in personal im m ortality ; i t is

a n

inescapable dimension

of

the human condi t ion, and there will be as many

different combinations

of

hope

and hindrance as there

arc

individual faiths

and l ives. T h c distinctive mix w ill be the result, a t

least

in part, of thc cre-

ative effort of cach pcrson. Immortality belief, then, is not an except ion jonl

the human condit ion but a specification o f it.



C H A P T E R

8

Imrnortdity: A Pragmatic-Processiwe

Model

I am the

resurrection and

the

life.

If

anyone

believes in me, even t h o u g h he dies

he

will live,

and whoever lives and believes in me will never

die.

Do

you

believe this?

”John

11

25-26

Leap,

life

Leap

and

dance.

Dance o u t of death.

Leap.

Dance.

Life,

sun-filled,

touch

the phoenix

self

of

death

to

life.

Death

to

life:

al l death

to

life

in flame.

-William Birmingham

“ T h e

Phoenix”

Just as it is unacceptable to advance a beIief in Go d with ou t ve ntu ring som e

guess

as to

the character of the divine,

so

it would be fruitless to present a

belief in im m or ta lity that did not-however tentatively and sketchily-sug-

gest what a ne w life would, or at least ought to, involve. As John Hick has

noted:

“A

doctr ine which can mean anything means nothing.

So

long,

then,

as we refrain fro m spelling o u t o u r faith it remains em pty .”’ In the same

vein, H.

D.

Lewis conten ds that

‘‘no

one can expect or believe anything

without having some idea

of

what i t is that he expects.”2 The task of this

chap ter, then, is

to

sugges t

a

model

of

the cosmic process that would jus t i fy

belief in imm ortality as attractive andas life-enhancing. In kee ping with the

experiential character and this-worldly focus

of

the pragmatism I espouse,

an y acceptable model will have to offer possibilities for the en han cem ent and

enrichment

of

life.

It will

be

unacceptable to the extent

that

it is an

escape



Immortality: A Prugmnti~-ProcessiveModel 201

from life as we here and now expe rience it .3 I t will be acceptable to the

extent that i t is an invitation to enter more dee ply and fully into such life.

Readers mig ht be aided by me ntally placing the te rm “th is life” in

quota-

tion ma rks, because the

nature

and scope

of

hu m an life is precisely w ha t has

been an d will l ikely co ntinu e to be m atter of intense dispute am on g reflec-

tive hu m an beings.

A

crucial aspect o f the dispute centers

on

w hat ough t to

be the relationship between the present and future haracteristics of this life.

Apart from a superficial “eat, dr ink , an d

be

m er r y” m ode of hedonism,

most reflective efforts have involved

some

vision or phi losophy of the fu-

ture. For example, n o thinkers have been more passionately opposed to any

philosophical or religiouspositing of anyotherworld han

Marx

and

Nietzsche.

In

i ts eschatological dime nsions, M arxism invok es

a

dedication

to

the

present in virtueof a belief that one is there by co ntrib uting to futu re

utopian state. Nietzsche , despite his radical individualism and fierce attacks

on

religion, manifests a profound concern for the future . However var ious ly

they may

be

interpreted, his doctr ines of revaluation, the overman, andeter-

nal return are calls to m ov e beyon d the present s ituat ion and bring forth

a

m o d e

of

life m or e creative an d fulfilling.

Ther e is,

I believe, a rather wide consensus

mong

contemporary th inkers

to shun both

a

view

of

the present devoid of s ignificant future and view

of the future hat reduces the present o

a

sheer means. Two texts from John

Dewey express a mode of this present-future dialectic:

We always live at the time we live and not at some other time, and only

by

extracting

at

each present time the full meaning of each present experience are

we prepared

for

doing the same thing

in the

future. This is the only prepara-

tion

which

in the

long

run amounts

to

anything.

The ideal

of

using the

present

simply

to

get

ready for the future contradicts

itself.

4

Albert Carnus expresses a similar sentiment when he notes ha t “rea l gener-

osity towa rd the future lies in giving

all

to the p r e ~ e n t . ” ~ illiam Ernest

Hocking, who is as sym pathetically inclined toward belief in im m ort ality as

Dewey and

Camus

are op po sed , asserts: “TO e able

to

give oneself whole-

heartedly to the present one must be persis tently aware that i ts not all. O n e

must rather be able to treat the presen t mo me nt as i f i t were engaged in the

business allotted to it by that total

life

which stretches indefini tely beyon d”

( M I , 155). A t the sam e tim e he rejects-quite properly, in m y view-any

not ion of the future thatwould give meaning

to a

presently me aningless life:

Unless

there

is

an immediately

felt

meaning there is no meaning at all; no

future meaning

could

compensate

for

a compIete absence o f meaning in the

present moment; and whatever meaning life may come to possess hereafter

must

be

simply the ampler interpretation

of

the meaning which it now has.

MI,

59)



202

Persord Znrnrortnlity:

Dcsirubility nr ld E J c n ~ y

Chr i stopher M ooney makes an allied point in som ew hat different language:

“C hristia n ho pe in resurrection will have me aning for us on ly to th e ex tent

that we have some inkl ing

of

resurrcction now, so m e experience o f fullness

of

life, o f self-discovery, love o r creativity.”6 Finally,

H. D.

Lewis co nsiders it

a great travesty

of

Chris t ian t ru th to suppose tha t we should think

of

o u r

salvation solely in t e rms

of

some destiny

to

be achieved later. I t is a present

reality, and the full realization of this is essential

to

the appreciation of Chris-

tian

claims and the impact they an have on our present a t t i tudes.B ut however

impor tan t th is emphasis may

be,

and however necessary in the commendation

of Christianity today, i t would

be

o d d , to say the least, if the

peculiar

rela-

tionship established between God and men in the coming of Christ were con-

cerned wholly

with

the presen t life.

I t

must

surely

be unders tood

in

thc

con-

text

of

an abiding fellowship. ( S I ,

207-8)

Th ese latter texts sugg est that an adeq uate mod el of the creative process

deman ds the m ost intense l iving in the present ,

a t

the same t ime remaining

open to the possibility of participating in transcendent and future mo des o f

existence.

To

arg ue in favor of belicf in immortality, i t is not necessary to

claim that such belief is necded to avoid a superficial presentism o r hedo n-

ism;

it is sufficient to show that there

is

nothing intrinsic to this belief that

leads

to

diverting energies fro m th e tasks

a t

ha nd . O ne can readily concede

that i t is possible for individuals

to

work in the present to builda fut ure life

in wh ich they believe they will havc no person al share; it does not follow,

however, that

a

belief that we rtlall be personal participants in this futu re life

is

a

deterrent or an obstacle to ou r living fully

at

thc prcsent moment. After

all,

few

wo uld claim that it is either unreasonable or unw or thy

of

young

persons to believe and to be taug ht that the efforts they are m ak ing at the

m om en t will affect the quality of their lives as adults. Indeed , the signifi-

cance

and depth of youthwould seem to be immeasurably increased

by

the

belief that youn g person s are participating in a process in which the futu re

depends upon the present.

PRAGMATIC-PROCESSIVE MODEL

T h e general fcatures of pragm atism’s mod el

of

the

cosmic

process have al-

ready been touched upon in m y earlicr discussion of metaphysics and the

self.

Keeping n min d

the

mode

of

pragmaticcxtrapolationemployed

thr ou gh ou t this essay, it rcma ins now

to

explore this m od el w ith specific

reference to im m orta l i ty or the po ssibility of new l ife conse quen t upo n

dea th. RecalI that for the p ragm atist the w orld is characterized by processes

and relations that can be expressed metap hysically in termsof ever changing

“fields within f ields.” T h u s the w orld or reality can be described

a s

a pro-

cessive-relational continuum or f ield embodying and bringing forth a plu-

rality of subfields, each with

a

unique focus but depend ent upo n, overlap-

ping with , an d sha din g in to o ther fields.



Imrnortality: A

Pragmnric-Processir,e

Model

203

From the pragm atic perspective, reality is pluralistic rather than m onistic.

Hence, it is a bit misleading to speak , as I have spok en, ofn o r the cosmic or

creative process. I t is more accurate

to

speak of

a

plurality of processes with

a

variety o f relations and interrelations. T ho ug h such

a

perspective

does

not

exclude th e possibility that on e of these processes is wider and more encom-

passing than all othc rs, it doe s exc lude the con cep tion o f this process as

absolute, with the n arrow er processes abso rbe d by it . M oreover, to afflrm a

plurality o f processes is no t t o a@lrrn chaos-nor is it to deny some kind

of

unity. This un ity can no t b e an essentially completed or finished unity, how-

ever, nor can it bc on e th at excludes plurality

or

makes plurality periphcral

or

accidental. W hatever uni ty b elo ng s to the coIlectivity of processes must,

to

be

con sistent with prag ma tism’s pluralisti: universe,

be

constituted

by

these processes. The con tribu tions these processes makes to this u nity are

no t necessarily e qua l; it is perm issible to believe that so m e m ak e signifi-

cantly greatcr contributions than others. Unity so viewed is itself

a

process:

reality is

a t

every moment “one,” and is

a t

every mo men t “becom ing one .”

Thus

the unity that pragmatismafflrms doe s no t exclude disunity. Indeed, if

our extrapolation retains experiential rootedness,

it

must include both uni ty

and disunity as characteristics of reality. None

of

this, how ever, excludes

a

belief in and a working toward increasing the unity and dim inishing the

disunity, toward a world of ever increasing harmony.

This

model

allows, then,

for

the highest and most intense mode

of

inter-

relationship and participation w itho ut los ing the distinctivencss and inde-

pendence o f th e participating p rocesses. S ince all these processes, according

to the specific qu ality o r character

of

each, are contr ibuting to the develop-

ment and enhancement of the collective who le, on e can speak w ith reason-

able consistency of their living

or

acting “for their ownsakes” while simul-

taneously con tribu ting to othe r processes-narrower and wide r. He nce, in

the language of present and future,

we

can plausibly live fully for the pres ent

while contr ibu ting to the em erging ife

of

the future.

This mo del is quite obvio usly evolution ary, and in sugg estin g an evolu-

tionary process in wh ich there em erge individua ls capable of sh arin g in life

beyond death, i t is hardly unique. Interest ing a nd frui tful comparison could

be

mad e wi th the models descr ibed

by

Henri

Bergson,

Pierre Teilhard de

Chardin, and Sri Aurobindo.’ O n e similarity w orth me ntioning is that they

all in so m e way affirm

a

co ntinu ity be twe en ou r experienced life and any

wider o r fu tu re l ife.8

This

means that ou r present acts are here and no w

contributing to a process o r processes far m or e extensive than is eviden t

to

ourordinaryconsciousness. O u r actions have presentandfuture conse-

quences for the character

and quality o f those p rocesses which can at best b e

only vaguely grasped. “It ma y be true,” Jam es tells us, “tha t wo rk is still

doing

in

the world-process, and that we are cal led to bear our share. The

character of the world’s results may in part dc pe nd up on ou r acts” (SPP,

11

2).

Elsewhere, James confesscs that he does not see “why the very exis-



204 Persottdmttortali ty:

Desirability and Eficacy

tcnce of an nvis ible wor ld may not in par t de pend on the personal response

which any one

of

us m ay m ak e to the rel igious appeal. God himself, n

shor t , may drawvital streng th and increase of very being

from o u r fidelity.

For m y ow n pa r t ,

I

do no t kn ow w ha t the sweat and blood and t ragedy o f

this life mean , if they m ean an ything sho rt of this. If this life be not a real

figh t, in w hich som ethin g is eternally gained for the universe by success, i t

is no better than gam e of private thcatricals fro m w hi chone may wi thdraw

at will”

(

WB, 5) .

This,

of

course, is an cxpression of a hope, but

so

i s the human is t or

M arxist claim that o u r present actions have a bearing, for better and for

worse, upon the future condi tion of humani ty . T he de pt h and scope of the

process needed for

a

plausible belief in im m or tali ty is ad m ittedly greater,

but all such claims share a com mitm ent to the prese nt based at least partly

o n a belief in consequences, many f w hi chwill be realized, f ever, on ly in

a

distant future.

Al though

I

a m c ertainly n ot sug gesting that these views are substantially

the same, the model I am arguing for s bo th l ike and unlike hum anist ic and

traditional “religious” approa ches. Later t will maintain that

a

transforma-

tionist character is essential to a n y n e w ife, and this moves m y m od el n the

direction

of

more traditional beliefs concerning

an

afterlife. T he p oi nt here

und er conside ration is

closer to

the human is tic emphasis

upon

th e signifi-

cance of present acts. Since “work is still doing in the w orld-proce ss,” our

actions have conseq uenc es radiating far beyo nd the boun ds

of

a narrowly

conceivedspatio-temporalpresent.Feeding hepoor,caring or

a

child,

tending he s ick,creat ingworks of art,so lvin g scientific problems-all

these and man y o ther hum anctivities m u st be seen as in

some

way advanc-

ing and deepening the quality of the world-processes, ju st as o ur negative

actions must

be

seen

as

impeding and d iminish ing them.

The pragmatic model contrasts sharply with one that w ould picture this

life as

a

test w hic h, if successfully e nd ure d, will deliver us from the tem-

poral process in to the etern al wo rld. Pra gm atism rejects th e classical du-

alism b etween the tempo ral

and

the eterna l. Since prag m atism affirms con-

t inuity between the narrower and m ore immed iate fields of ou r experience

with the wider and mo re encompass ing ones, o u r everyday activities take

on grea ter significance than n raditional religious

or

humanis t ic views.

Historical and cosm ic processes-known an d unknown--arc no t processes

from which w e are s t r iving

to

escape, nor are they tales “to ld by an idiot,

signifyingnothing,”Howevermysterious hedeeperandmoreultimate

characteristics of these processes are, a pragmatic perspective allows for

a

belief and a hop e that t ranscend, without negating or diminishing, the mo re

imm ediately accessible fruits and consequen ces of these processes. T im e is

not something to b e g o n e t h r o u g h o r g o t t e neyond; i t

is

itself reality inso-

far as i t br ings forth nov elty and growth

as

we11 as loss an d d i r n i n ~ t i o n . ~

Since chance is

one

characteristic

of

creative processes, their outcome

is

nei-



Itnmortality: A Pragmotic-Processive Model 205

ther preset nor totally determined, even by the divine participant. T h e char-

acter and quality of the processes that constitute reality, present and future,

will

be

determined

by

the free creative acts

of

all the participants, only

a

few

of

which, perhaps, are actually know n to

us

a t

t he m om en t .

Any model of the creative processes that allows for im m orta lity m ust

account no t on ly for the elation

of the present world to some future wor ld

but

also to dimensions

of

the present world to wh ich we do not usually

attend. Further, no m od el of reality would serve belief in immortality if i t

allowed only for the em ergen ce a t some future t ime

of persons

capable

of

participating endlessly in the divine life. This would exclude a possible im-

mo rtality for all hum an persons involved in the evolutionary process save

those w ho had the

good

for tune to emerge in

ts

final stage .

THIS WORLD-OTHER W O R L D

Whateve r

we

may think

of

those lengthy and at t imes tor tuoush e o l o g d

speculations concerning im m ed ia t e j udgm en t and inal jud gm en t , the s ta te

of souls prior to the resurrection, and the like, they were concerned w ith

a

question that no imm ortality extrapoIa tion can avoid: namely, the continu-

ing existence of

those persons w h o die prior to the eschaton. Thou gh the

detailed mode

of

such

existence may be almostcomp letely beyond ou r

imaginative powers, th e belief in

such

an existence is plausible only if it is

also plausible to extrapolate an othcr wo rld dis t inct but not separate

from

this one.

But

will this n ot

be

an escape into that oth crw orld ines s that has

been

so

sou nd ly criticized in the m od crn era ? Perhaps,

b u t

thcre are indica-

tions that this question has no t been as decisively settIed as m a n y o n b o th

sides imagine.

T h e difficulty rests in the not-so-evident m ea ni n g ormeanings attached

to

the phrases “this wo rld” a nd “othe r w orld.” The quest ion involv eds som e-

whatanalogous

to

thatconcerning“natural”and“supernatural.”When

there was a consensus on the nontranscenden t mean ing of nature, affirma-

tion of transcend ence me ant that the theist posited so m e kind of super-

natural, which the secuIarist denied. But when nature is taken

as

provision-

al, processive, and open-ended, the question

is

t ransformed: wenow seek to

understand the various dimensions

of

nature or reality, a nd th e supernatural

is either relativized (as is nature) o r irrelevant. Similarly, when “this world”

was understood in

a

m o re restricted materialistic-mechanistic

scnse,

or

in

the Greek-Medieval scnse o f a closed and finished republic

of

natures, then

afirrnation

of

an “otherworld”was indispensable to avoid cutting OK

im po rtant hu m an possibilit ies. N o w that this dialectic appears to have ru n

its course, a ne w mo de l is called for, on e that will avoid an escapist other-

worldliness and a superficia1 this-worldliness.

There are, to begin wi th , good grounds

for

extrapolating worlds other

than

those

more commonly recognized .

For

example, it is quite evid ent that

any refercnce

to

“this w orld” is relative and perspectival.

l 2

Remaining close



206

Persorid I m m o r t a l i t y : D e s i r a b i l i t y nrid Ejicncy

to ordinary experience, we can see that a t every moment and a t different

moments we are engaged in a plurality of “worlds.” We speak, for example,

of the “workaday world,” the “world of art,” the “scientific world,” the

“world

of

common sense.” We do not designate one of these the “real

world” and call the rest “subjective” or “imaginary.” Each is real insofar as it

bears upon the concrete presence and continuing development of life. If the

mystical world or the divine world meet this criterion of vital presence, and

that is the claim and belief of many, then these worlds are no more and no

less “other” than, say, the world of art or the world of science. I do not

claim for them the same kind or degree of evidence, but I do argue that the

reality of an other world cannot be rejected solely because it is not identical

with some alleged “this world.”

Of course, for the pragmatist, such other worlds are always matters of

belief, but at least one pragmatist- William James-maintained that such

belief, or overbelief, was neither alien nor opposed to experience. “If needs

of ours outrun the visible universe,” James argues, “why

riiay

not that be a

sign that an invisible universe is there?”

( W B ,

51).13Two texts show how

seriously James entertained the notion that we participate in worlds of which

we are unaware or only vaguely aware.

The whole drift of my education goes to persuade me that the world of our

present consciousness is only one out of many worlds of consciousness that

exist, and that those other worlds must contain experiences which have a

meaning for our life also; and that although in the main their experiences and

those of this world keep discrete, yet the two become continuous

a t

certain

points, and higher energies filter in.

(VRE,

408)

In spite of rationalism’s disdain for the particular, the personal, and the

1.111-

wholesome, the drift of all the evidence we have seems to me to sweep us very

strongly towards the belief in some form of superhuman life with which we

may, unknown to ourselves, be co-conscious. We may be in the universe as

dogs and cats are in our libraries, seeing the books and hearing the conversa-

tion, but having no inkling of the meaning of it all.

( P U , 140)14

I find that last sentence the experiential base for the extrapolation of other

worlds. l 5 It is important to recall that an extrapolation is not constructed in

air but must be an imaginative construct suggested by data given in experi-

ence.

l6

Moreover, successful acts of imagination enrich and enhance experi-

ence and reality, often in ways not immediately evident.17 We could add to

the situation cited by James innumerable instances in which organisms are

totally unaware of processes which at every moment contribute to the con-

stitution of their being. Focusing on human experience, we have evidence of

what might be called “unaware participation.” To what extent are most

human beings ,aware of their involvement in social and historical worlds,

processes that have a reality not simply reducible

to

the consciousnesses of



Iin mortality :A

Pragtna

ic- Processive Model

207

their constituent members? Nietzsche’s genealogical inquiries, Freud’s psy-

choanalytic techniques, Marxist and structuralist analyses all claim to reveal

the underlying structures of morality or the psyche or history or language.

These are imaginative efforts to bring to light worlds that are operative in

human life but not attended to consciously.

O f course, the most significant data pointing toward the reality of a world

or worlds other than or beyond the customary one are the claims of those

we call mystics. From the pragmatic perspective, these claims do not prove

the reality of such worlds but, as James argued in

The Varieties ofReligious

Experience, they may not be lightly dismissed. The pragmatist would insist

that despite the mystic’s claim to direct experience of God or the O ne or the

Absolute, there is still

a

faith or interpretive dimension to these experiences.

The issue here, however, is not whether the mystic is correct in describing

his or her experience as intuition or higher knowledge or enlightenment.

Whatever the description, we have an enormous number of individuals dis-

tributed over the length of human history and a variety of cultures who

make experiential claims which, to say the least, remain decisively unac-

counted for within a narrow space-time framework. Such data, combined

with other factors, contribute to the plausibility of extrapolating as real

some dimensions that transcend the narrow confines of our conventional

world. Such data will, of course, fail to persuade someone who has not had

at least an experiential inkling of what the mystic points toward. Unless one

has, minimally, a vague sense of something “more” to life than that which

constitutes our quotidian experience, the extrapolation

I

propose will lack

meaning and validity. l8

C O N T I N U I T Y B E T W E E N P R E S E N T LIFE A N D N E W LIFE

Granting the plausibility of extrapolating the reality of an other world, what

characteristics would make a new life in it desirable? Bernard Williams, who

rejects the desirability of immortality, nevertheless lists some of those char-

acteristics. The first is “that it should clearly be me who lives forever.” I have

already stressed at some length that personal survival is crucial to any signif-

icant immortality. l 9 Williams’s second condition is “that the state in which I

survive should be one which, to me looking forward, will be adequately

related, in the life it presents, to those aims which

I

now have in wanting to

survive at

A process model along the lines suggested allows for this effective con-

tinuity between our present life and any new life. I t does

so

in its insistence

that we act in the belief that we are contributing to a process or processes

wider in scope and longer than those of which we are immediately aware.

While not limiting any future participation

to

the exact mode in which we

are now participating, we must believe that those aims, goals, and ideals that

now energize us will remain in some way operative in any new life.



Any adequate model of the reative process and extrapolated immor ta l i ty

will have to take account of the eternal. Even Nietzschc, though ready to

surrenderG od ndm m orta lity, is unwilling to partwith eternity,”

Zarathu stra sings

a

h ym n proclaiming that “all joy wan ts eternity

/

Wants

deep, wants deep eternity.”21 Nietzsche wants an eternity located neither in

somedistant uturenor nsomeotherworldprcsently inaccessible to

h u m a n

experience.

An impor tant e lement

of

the Christian tradition also

insists,despitedifferences, on th e possibility-indeed thc necessity-of

here-and-now participation

in

the eternal. Friedrich Schleiermach cr insists

that just such participation is the authcnt ic modeof immortal i ty .

The goal and

the

character

of

the

religious

lifc

is

not

the

immortality

desired

and

belicved

in by many. . .

.

I t

is

no t the immorta l i ty that is outside

of

time,

behind i t , or rather after i t , a n d which still is i n time.

I t

is the immorta l i ty

which we can n o w have in

this

temporal life;

it

is the problem

in

the solut ion

of which

we

are forever to be engaged. in the midst of f ini tude to be one with

the Infinite

and

i n

every

m o m e n t

to be

cternal is the immortality of religion.”

T h o u g h w i t h

a

slightly different emphasis,

Soren

Kicrkegaard makcs m uch

the

same point : “Immortal i ty cannot

be

a

final alteration that crept in,

so

to

speak,

a t

t he m om en t of death as thc final stage.

O n

the contrary, it is a

changelessness that is not altered by the passage

of

the yca~s . ’ ’ ‘?~

T h o u g h

the

pragmat ic modcl

of

reality wo uld not employ the language of

SchleierrnacherandKierkegaard,and nparticular w ou ld no t acceptany

literal meaning

of

“changeless,” it remains open to the dep th

of

experience

they call for. W hat it wo uld need is an accou nt allowing for, cvcn insisting

upon,

a

relation to

God or

thc divine o r the eternal

that is

evcrlasting wich-

ou t

being

everlastingly the

same.

In such an account, “changeless” might be

accepted as

a

s ym bol

of

the constancy or t rustworthiness

of

divine love

but

would not exclude some kind

of

chan ge in both the divine and the human

relata.

To

shift the focus

a

bit-it is exactly evcrlastingness that

is

questioned as

to whether i t is hu m anly desirable by ma ny who reject person al imm or-

tality. A t stake here

is

whether durat ion is

a

value that ma kes an endlessly

endur ing

life

desirable. Williams, who argues against Lucretius that “ m o re

days

may

give

us

rnorc than

one

day,” nevertheless denies that unending life

would give us an ythin g over and abovc wh at can be realized in a life that

ends: “There is no desirable or significant property

which life

would have

more of,

or

have more unqualifiedly, if

we

lasted forever”

( P S , 89).

The

coun terview is expressed by Hocking:

“ D w a t i o n is

a

dimwsion

ufunl-

u e . ” Ge org e Santayana maintains that “len gth of things is vanity, only their

height is Butccording to Hocking, “it is theormalestiny

of

experience

to be

prolonged in propor t ion to itsheight,not n versely”;

hence,

“life

is objectively

worth morc

as

a

continued than

as a

closed affair”

( M I , 68-69).



209

N E W LlFE: DURATlON AND TRANSFORMATION

T h e attractiveness or unattractiveness

of

durat ion wil l depend upon how i ts

to

be un ders too d. Be rgso n, find ing it t tractive, describes i t as “the continu-

ous

progress

of

the past which gnaws into the futureand w hich swells

as

i t

advances.”2c)O n the other hand, those w h o f ind

endless

duration unattrac-

tive presup pose that it involve s an unending con tinuance of fundarnental ly

the same mode of life. Thus Williams, in citing the M akrop ulos case

as

evidence that one would become bored

by

an immortal life, describes a life

that had really no t cha ng ed for some three hun dred years, a life devo id of

significant gro w th an d rcal novelty. This. same presupp osition, that

a

life of

unending duration would

be

merely an indefinite extensiono f h u m a n ife in

the

same

mode

as

it

now

exists, und ergirds the view s

of

those

who

dis-

tinguish it fro m the etern al life o f Christian tradition. “E ternal life,” we are

told

byStewartSuthe rland, “is no t to

be

equa ted w it h endless We are

not told, howevcr, just what the digcrcnce is between the two,

and

while

conceding that any new life can no t bc identical wi th o u r present one, I con-

fess that I am completely unable to g rasp w hat an eternal life wo uld be that

excluded the characteristic

of

everlastingness. T h e d istinguished Am erican

philosopher John Smith has expressed

a

view similar to those being chal-

lenged; thoug h mo re und erstandab le,

i t

retains the presupp osition

of

un-

ending sam eness. Sm ith conside rs “historically inaccurate” the “belief that

the Judaeo-Christian tradition espouses a doctr ine of ‘immortality.’

On

the

contrary, he

symbol of

‘eternal life’ expresses

a

new dimens ion or new

quality of life and in no sense

implies

merely the endless continuation

f

the

same.”28

While

I

qu estio n, in part, his interpretation

of

Judaeo-Christian

tradition, I can understand Smith’s existential interpretation of eternal life. I

have already expressed str on g reservations concerning the efficacy

of

any

such

interpretation; m y concern here, however, is wit h his assertion hat

everlastingness is to be unders tood as “forever more of the same.” M u c h

closer

to the ma rk, in m y opin ion, is John Baillie’s view that “t he soul’s

ho pe has not been for m or e of the same, but for something al together high-

er and better.”29

What

we need is a doctr ine of transformation that enables

us

to acknowl-

edg e bo th con tinu ity an d difference between the present life and any new

life that m ight be hoped for. Tha t transforrnationist views are congenial to

those reflecting within

a

Christ ian framew ork

is

evidenced in the following

texts from

E.

J. Fortmann and William Frost:

Does the end

of

the world mean its annihilation and re-creation)

o r

merely its

transformation?. .

.

Today the second view, transformation and not annihila-

tion, seems to be growing stronger and stronger. Those whohoId it think that

the biblical passages should be construed as “change-passages,” not as “anni-

hilation-passages,”if they are taken in a fuller biblical context.3*

This

theology

of hope

places imagination in

a

Christian context. Christ,

the

Messiah, is portrayed

as

one

who does

not simply

take the facts of

life for



granted.

In

his

un ique

contribution to

the

human

race

he encourages us to

work

and

labor for the transformation of things so that

the

kingdom may

become

a

reality. .

.

.

This

emphasis

on

transformation

of

reality

in

the

name

of

life’s

promises

and

expectations culminates

in

the narratives

of

Christ’s

rcs-

urrection.

Thus Christians receive

the

promise o f a life beyond

the grave.31

Any process

model

of reality is andmustbe ransforrnationist,but

whether this is a h elp or a hin dra nc e to belief in personal im m orta l i ty is a

much more com plicated quest ion. Any evolutionary theory that extrapo-

lates some m o d e

of

new be ing or ne wconsciousness must confront

a

dilem-

ma: if the chan ges in h um an naturere su ch that this nature rema ins asical-

ly as we no w kn ow it , then there is n o possibility for the kind of divine

com mu nity projected by the best visionary thinkers; if ,

on

the other han d,

such

a

co m m un i ty is ma de poss ible by a tota l t ransformat ion of h u m a n

nature, then w e n o lon ge r have hum an nature as w e n o w

know

it. Because

the available ev olutio nary data are am big uo us , i t is possible to m ak e two

very diKerent extrapolations of the futu re: o ne in wh ich hu m anity con tinu es

to exist, houg h in a profoundly t ransformed m anner ; another in which

huma nity disappears and a ne w species em erg es. Initially, this second in-

terpretat ion would seem to be m or e consistent with our present knowledge

of

theevolutionary process.After all, therevolutionaryand,formany,

threatening aspect of Darwinism was that it posited the ‘‘transformation of

species.” T h e crucial consequence of evolution would seem to be that justs

t h e h u m a n e m e r g e das a new species from a species

no

longer in existence,

in the distinct fu ture there will be such a transformation of the hum an spe-

cies that

it

will become extinct .

While this

is

surely a plausible extrapolation, it is not strictly entailed by

the evidence. To begin w ith, w e are no t compelled to assu m e hat the way

in

which evolut ion will c ont inu e

to

take

place

is

identical with the way n

wh ich it has aken place. Indeed , such an assum ption wo uld seem to

be

contrary to o n e

of

the

more

exciting features o f evolution-the em erg enc e

of the radically new. He nc e, wh ile up to this point the transformation

of

species appears to have resu lted in

a

loss of fundame ntal ident i ty between

the old an d the new, we cannot defini tively rule out a change

in

the evolu-

tionaryprocess tself w he reb y

future

transformation-whether in “this

world” or in an “o the r world”-wilI result in enrichm ent witho ut the loss

of

identity.

I suggest that there are a l ready some grounds

or

such an extrapolation in

both individual and collective development. The t ransformat ion of a fertil-

ized

egg

in to

a

relatively helpless, speechless, instinctive infant and then into

an adult capable of wondrous feats

of

creat ivity wo uld not seem to be

qualitatively

less

s ignificant than the t ransformat ion o f a fish in to

a

reptile.

Yet there is

a

m o d e of identity present

in

the form er transform ation that

is

absent in the latter.Further,wenowrecognize hat the earlierstages of

individual h u m an lives

have

a

value

and me aning in them selves wh ile irnul-



irnmortdity: A Prgtrratii-Pr#cessive Model 21 1

taneously c on tribu ting, positively o r negatively, to the ransform ed later

stages in which ide ntity continu es, how ever profoundly t ransformed.

Shifting o ur focus to the hu m an collectivity, we are able

to

detect further

grounds

for

affirminggreat ransformativedevelopmentwithoutsimple

loss of identity. Co nsider the evolution

of

Homo,

which began w i th

Horno

habilis abou t two and a half million years ago, was transformed into Homo

erectus abou t one and a half million years

ago,

and became Homo

sapiens

some three hundred thousand years ago. Although anthropologists arc not

in com plete agreement as to ho w “CIOSC”

Horrto bnbilis

was to th e prcsent-

day Homo

sapiens,

they

do

seem to be making two judgments . Fi rs t , they are

distinguishing the earlicstHomo fro m that speciesof which it was a transfor-

mation. Second, they are affkming

a

mo de of “identi ty” betw een hat origi-

nal

Horno

and the present-day

one.

Sincc no on e would deny the profound

chang es that have

taken

place

within

hum ani ty over those two and

a

half

million years-or even over the three hu ndre d thou san d years of

Homo

sa-

piens-transformation and ident i ty cannotbe asserted as mu tua lly exclusive.

Some modesof t r amformat ion doresult in lossof identity, but others result

in transformed iden tity.

that

a

new qual i ty or

mode

of

l ife has already emerged from

the

evolution-

ary process, on e that allows for an even greate r trans form ation w ithou t loss

of identity than

in

the previous stages of evolution. Hence, one m igh t now

extrapolate

a

new level o f human existence that will be inconceivably diger-

en t f rom butnevertheless fundamental ly continuous with our present

mode

of lifc. T h e alternative e xtrapolation, which has already been criticized, s to

view h um anity as a means o r preparat ion for the emergence f

a

new species

(whether n“thiswor ld” o r inany“otherworld”) hatwil lre ta in he

hum an only in the way in w hich we now retain the subh um an f rom wh ich

we have evolved.

Ther e

is

a form idable diff iculty w ith the mode of extrapolation I favor,

and i t must be faced, tho ug h I

do

not know h o w to resolve it even

to

my

ow n satisfaction. It can be o bjected that I am cond a t ing two distinct time-

space continua

by extrapolating om

the

evident time-space c o n t i n u u m

available to science to the not-so-evident time-space continuurn

of

an other

world. Thus , even if on e w ere to c once dehat there will be a fut ur e transfor-

mation

of

the

hu m an species along the lines

1

have suggested , this

is

radi-

cally different from some future o r new life entered into by all humans-

past andpresent as well as future-on th e occasion of their ndividual

deaths. T he mo st serious threat to th e perspective here advanced is that a

claim that such a new life is already available t o th o se w h o die renders the

long evo lution ary process irrelevant. One way o ut is to say that the purp ose

of evolution, or at least

a

consequence of it, was to br ing for th

a

species

whose individualsare so constituted hat death henceforthhas he pos-

sibility

of

t ransformation rather than obli teration. While som ethin g suc h

as

Further, i t m igh t be sug ge sted , as Teilhard de Chardin apparent ly



this mu st be held if m y claims for

personal

imm ortality are to stand, it still

leaves un settled the que stions of w hy evolution should be continuing and

w h y we should be working here and now to br ing about a fut ure transfor-

mation

of

the human communi ty .

In response,

1 must revert to

the

contention that our actionsand heir

consequences are not con fined within thos e processes available to ordinary

and scientific consciousness. M y entire case dep end s up on a belief such as

that which w e havc already heard expressed by James:

T h e world

of

u r present consciousness is

only

one out of many

worlds

of

consciousness that exist, and

.

.

.

those other worlds must contain expcriences

which have a meaning for o u r life also; and . .

. al though in

the main their

experiences

and

those of this

world

keep

discrete,

yet

the two

become

contin-

u o u s at

certain points, and higher

energies

filter

in.

(VRE, 408)

Given such

a n

overlapping an d interpenetration of processes and worlds, it

makes sense

to

excrt o ur fullest efforts toward trans form ing the wor ld or

worlds

most

imm ediately accessible to us, spu rre d on by he belief that thcsc

efforts bear fruit we are unable toperccive clearly at th is mo me nt .

T h e

evo-

lutionary process, therefore, is multidimensional,and human participa-

tion-past, pre sen t, an d future-is n o t restricted

to

the most imm ediately

conscious

Incidcntally, an evolutionaryodel such as this is

congenial,

I

believe, to a reconstruction

of

the traditional doctrine of the

com m union

of

saints and the practice

of

praying for and to the dead.

N E W L I F E : P O S I T I V E CH A RA CT E RI S T I CS

However radical the transformation that brings about

a

new life would be, it

cannot be such as to obliterate all trace

of

those characteristics that presently

constitute hum an Me. P ro m ine nt am on g the characteristics

of

human l ife

that seem inseparable fr o m it are creative action, g ro w th , self-development,

love, joy, laughter, com mu nity, suffering, struggle, and loss.

I f

we are to

extrapolate these as

also

be long ing t o any newife, it cannot

be

too s t rongly

stressed that

by such extrapolation we are able to kn ow as m u c h and as little

about the new life mo de of thesecharacteristics as

we

can about them when

they are extrapolated

as

belonging to G o d . T h e same possibilities and lim-

itations tha t attach to talking

abo1.1l

God would attach to talking

a6out

any

new

l ife. T he most obviou s l imitat ion at tending any “new life” extrapola-

tionconcerns he“new ” aspect, ofw hic h lit tle ornothing can be said

positively. That

a

f u t u r e life such as the one here suggested and hoped for

must be new in an inconceivable and unim aginabie way seems both

con-

genial to and man dated by faith and reason. The ‘‘newness” ch aracterizing

the risen Chr i s t is a belief of

long

s tanding.

A s

one com me ntator succinctly

expresscd it, “T he Resu rrection was no t merely

a

corning back to life, but a

birth into a new life wh ich Ch rist did no t have in his bodily human ity.”34

The

evidence from reason for the necessity

of

newness is quite simply

the



immortality: A P r g ma t i c - P r o c ~s s i l ~codel 213

dissolution which, in o ur experience, acconlpanics all living beings. Unless

there is a “n ew ” character realized thr ou gh death and the saving gracc of

God, thcrc is

no

possibility

of

a l ife withou t dissolution-w ithout death.

Let

me

no w briefly discuss the necessity that the positive characteristics

of

human life continue in some way in an y ne w life. It is quite obv ious that

since pragmatism’s process metaphysics denies any absolute permanency or

status, i t cann ot consistently allow for any new life from which process or

change is completely absent. But

a

central feature of process or change is

that a t its best i t brings about growth. Hence, pragmatis t could not extrap-

olate any divine o r

new

hu m an life that w ou ld exclude the possibility of

growth , Thcre s

a

growing consensus, despite metaphysical and theological

differences, that an y ne w life m us t

be

a

gr ow ing or proccssivc on e.

“ A

cer-

tain growth,” Piet Sch oon enb crg tells us, “also remains possible i n thc final

fulfillment. Otherwiseeoulderh aps cease to be

Ignace

Lepp ma intains that “the idea of progress is in fact so intimately related to

that of life that we

can

only conceive o f eternal life

as

cternal growth.”36

Similarly, Jo hn Shea rejccts the no tion of a static heaven, noting hat “m an y

people cannot conccivc of hum an happiness except in terms of grow th”

( H H , 86).37

Grow th, wh ether hum an, cosm ic, or divine, is possible

only

insofar as

the participative realities o r beings

have

the power of crcativc action. Diverse

as

the

activities may be, all realities-from electro ns to God-are real in

vir tue of and to the extent that they arc centers of activity. I t follows, then,

that o u r extrapolation of

a

new life will include the possibility of propor-

tionate crcativc activity for the participants

in

such

a

life. “ I t is the yearning

after continued action,” according to B erg son , “tha t has led

to

thc belief in

an after-life.”38

And

Goethe . in

a

letter toJ. P. Eckermann asserted: “To

m e

the eternal existence

of

m y sou l is proved by m y idca

of

activity.’’39

The

creative activity

performed

by those entities dcsignatcd selves is di-

rectly or indirectlyboundupw ith self-developm cnt o r self-realization.

Pragmatism shares the view of those who insist that the self is

a

project or

task, not

a

fully realized given. I t is the task of self-creativity beg un in this

life that m us t be extrapolated as co ntinu ing in an y ne w ife. Joh n Shea makes

clear that such

a

viewpoint is not restricted to a pragm atic extrapolation:

“When t imeand history arc no t viewed as terrors but as m edium s ofhuman

development, heaven will not

be

viewed as external and static perfection.

Heaven will be

a

t ime for continued growth and moral progress . T h e pro-

ject of each man’s life which is bcgun in this world demands more t ime to

develop” ( H H , 86). Similarly, Hocking contends that there can be no sense

to

a co ntin uin g life unless “t he reflective self is concrete a nd active, carry ing

on that qu est ioning wh ich is

the

identity of its life here” ( M I , 66).4‘

In his “justification”

of

the desire for irnnlortality, Ralph B arton Perry

note s that “the re is always

some

unfinished busincss.” Further, “t he desire

for

m or e life springs from the belief that life o n the wh ole

is

goo d, and

to



214 Persutlnl

Imrttortality: D e s i r n l r i l i t y arzd Eficacy

ask for mo re t ime s

to

have

s o m e

affirmative

reason

for its use.”41

erry w a s

in

all likelihood nfluenccd n his m atte r by his mentor, William

Janlcs.

Perry tells us:

AsJames grew oldcr he came to belirve i n irnnlorcality. in

1904

hc had acquired

a feeling of its

“probabil i ty .” Although hc did not

feel a

“rational need”

of

it,

he felt a

growing

“practical need.” What

was

this practical motive ?

I n

explain-

ing w h y he was now, late in

life,

acquiring the

belief

for thc first t ime, he said,

“Because I

a m

j u s t get t ing fit to live.” .

.

. W ith his temperamental

love of

the

living, his affectionate sympathies,

and

his

glowing

moral admirations, he had

come

m o r e

and more

to feel

that dcath was a wanton

and

unintclligible n ega-

tion of goodness. (TC,11:356)42

N o n e

of

this,

of

course,

i n

any way provcs that we arc im m orta l . T hc m ost

that can

be

claimed is that it indicates a certain memitrg and

propriety

that

would accompany a new life in wh ich the projects and asks”inc1uding thc

task

of

self-creation-that have becn be gu n an d that death a l w a y s lcaves

un-

finished, would bc c on tin ue d a nd b ro ug ht to fu llcr r e a l i z a t i ~ n . ~ ~

T h e activity w hich above all ot he r hu m an activities secms to cry o u t for a

continu ance withou t end is, of course, love. “ T h e surest warrant for im-

mortal i ty,” according toJames, “is the yearning of ou r bowels for ou r dear

ones” (PP,

RY37). Mooney

poin t sou t that “hu m an love

.

. .

is quite

shameless

in

hop ing for immor ta l i ty and believes against all evidencc that it

will no t be affected by dea th” (PAT, II:146).44Gcorgc Maloney

suggests

that

“ our love relations here a nd now determine the true, future direction

of

o u r

psychic

powers

and the degree that they will be realized” (PAT, 1:147).

Whether or n o t love is a s ign o f a continuing life, there

seems

to

bc

no

question that it is the human expe rience mo st painfully frustrated by the

event of dea th . The love relation has an en du rin g character that the present

conditions make difficult if not impossible to realize. The love relation is

continua lly strained and ravaged b y a mu ltiplicity o f factors, but those loves

that endure seem to express most adequately theessence o f lovc. One o f t h e

painful features of ou r present m o d e

of

existence

is

that some

loves do cnd,

o r become incapable

of

being maintained in their richest

mode

and greatest

intensity.Nevertheless, tappears to be humanly mpossible to love and

simultaneously accept w ith ou t pain that love

will

end ab solutely and with-

o ut remainder, as

death seems to

indicatc.

The

death

of

a loved one is almost

beyond q uestion the m ost tragic experience human beings undergo.

Th is tragic antithe sis betw een Love and death is

po ign antly expressed by

Th om as Ha rdy in his

Tess

o f t h e

D’Uvbervilles.

A s Tess is leaving her hus-

ban d, An gel Clare, short ly before sh e is to be hanged , thc following ex-

chan ge takes place:

“Tell me

now,

Angel, do you think that we shall mcet again after we

are

dead?

I want to know.”

H e

kissed her

to

avoid

a

reply

a t

such

a

t ime .



It~lrnurrality:A Pragrnntic-Pvocessiv~lModel 215

“ O h ,

Angel-]

fear that

means no ” said she

with

a

suppressed

sob. “And

I

wanted so to see you again--so much,

so

m u c h What-not cvcn you

and

I,

Angel, who

love

each

other so weIi?”4s

Tess

docs not fcar death; what she finds intolerablc is that thc lovc betwe en

herself and Angel will en d w ith her dcath-and it will end exc eptas a mem-

o r y

for Angel if shc ceases to be. I t would seem that if death is the annihila-

tion

of

the individua l, one cann ot rcally be said to love sornconc who

has

died. If lovc involves the tou ch ing of tw o relational ccnters,

the

cessation of

one of these cen tcrs necessitates th c cessation of love. I t

would not

scern

possible to really love a nont‘xistcnt,

a

nothing. Of course, i t migh t

bc

ar-

gued

that love is ma intained through

a

mem ory , bu t unless the mem ory

involves somc kind of “prescnce”

of

the othe r, it is short-lived, as experi-

ence repcatedly shows. Gabricl Marcel has sensitively and perccptivcly

ex-

plored the rolc of “presence” in thc relationship betwe cn love and death.

“Fidelity truly exists,” hc maintains,

“onIy

w hcn it defies abscncc, wh en it

triu m ph s over absencc, and in particular, over that absence w hich we ho ld to

be-mistakenly n o doub t-absolute, and wh ich we call death.’’46

Love, then, is the

experience

that

gives

the

deepest

ground for

and

great-

est impe tus to extrapo lating

a

l ife that is not absolutely terminated by death.

Further, any desirable new life m u s t be such

that

the love relations

so

haltingly and imperfectly bcgun here, including those interrupted

or

diver-

ted,will have an op po rtun ityor reconciliation,enewal,nduller

realization.

A central feature of pragmatism, as

was

seen earlier, is that human indi-

viduals are consti tuted

by

their social

or

co m m un al relationships. T his view,

of course, is no t peculiar to pragm at ism but s shared by a range

of thinkers

in

thc twentieth century.47 An immediate corollary

of

the conlmunal nature

of hum ans is the need to construc t com mu nit ies or

a

com m uni ty

that

will

enrich and expand the actualities an d possibilities of hu m an life. T he re is a

consensus that to this point in history the communi t ies

that

have emerged

are radically deficient in terms

of

enab ling their mem bers to reach the full-

ness

of their potential. There follow s, then, if not a consensus, a widely

shared notion

that h u m a n

efforts ought to

be directed to creating a t ruly

hum an com m un i ty

free

from those features that n ow

limit

and destroy so

many.

Whether

in Utopian, M arxian,

or

Deweyan form, the

call

for such

a

co m m un ity involves an extrapolat ion from past and present experience

to

future cxperience. An y sug ge st ion o f a desirable immortality must include

an extrapolation similar to though obviously not identical with

such

future

comm unity extrapolat ions. I t will sha re with these 4‘secularist” extrapola-

tions the notion that we are “h ere and now” str ivin g to crcate a better com-

munity that will, we hope, bc realized in the future. At the same timet will

not

restrict the param eters of this com mu nity, either in its present strug-

gling fo rm or its future realized fo rm ,

to

a

narrowly conceived “this world.”



Further, and

most

impor tant , the k ind of extrapoiation called for will no t

restrict

membership

in the

“ n c w

co m m u n i t y ” to

those

individuals who

had

the good for tunc

o

c o m e

i n t o

existence concurrent with thc fruitfulrealiza-

tion o f the often pow erful efforts o f

so

many o ther ind iv iduak48

N E W LIFE:

NEGATIVE

CHARACTERISTICS

To

this point the extrapolation

of a

desirable immortali ty has focused on

w hat m ight be callcd thcpositive aspects

of

an y new life that m igh t be

forthcoming after death. I f

we

are to avoid

a

kind

of

self-dcception or “bad

faith,”however, wecannot ignore certainnegativeaspects hat properly

should be extrapolated as likely to accompany this new life. Let me ment ion

three such aspects-struggle,suffering,and loss-and indicate w h y

a n d

how they shou ld be incorporated into a developed extrapolation of irnmor-

tality.

T he evolutionary process

at all

levels and stages gives n o evidence

of

tak-

ing

place

w ithou t the see m ingly essential character

of

“ s t r ~ g g l c . ” ~ ~

n ex-

trapolated life totally

devoid of

s t ruggle would

scern

to involve

a

discon-

tinuity, which has been prev ious ly rulcd out, betw een the pres ent life and

the

new

Iifc . T he m ore en com pa ssin g process extrapolated f rom t he more

immediate

processes

of

our

experience has been described as con tinuo us

w ith these processes.

In

other terms, that divine

life

in w hich any

new

life

would be a participation

is

already in

a

real relation to and hence in

some

way

a

participation in the wor ld

of

immedia te

experience, just

as hu m an life

is really related to and already p articipating in the divin e life. I t follows that

God is a part icipant n he evolut ionary struggle.50 How hen could

we

properly extrapolate

a

ne w life that wo uld

be

transformed p articipation in

the divine life,

while

excluding fro m such

new life

that strugglc wh ich even

the divine

does

not escape?

No,

the struggle that is inseparable fr om hu m an

life appears to

be

related

to

on e that is cos m ic and cven in

a

sense “trans-

C O S M ~ C . ” ~ ~

This ,

of

course, touches upon that decpcst

of

myster ies, the mystery of

evil. With

no

pretense

to

resolving the irresolvable, let

m e

sim ply indicate

a

respons e consistent with pragm atism. First, pragm atism , as

we

saw in the

chapter “Self and Go d,” st rongly objects

to

any view

of

evil that sees it

either

as

incorporated within the eternal lan

of

an ornniscicnt , omnipotent

God

o r as preserved but overco me w ithin the W hole

or

the Absolute . T h e

only philosophical account of cvil cong enial

to

prag m atism is one that ener-

gizes hum an being s in their strugglc to lessen and ov ercom e it . He nce, any

pragmatic

im m ort ali t y belicf will

be in

part

motivated

by

the h ope and de-

sire

of

havin g n ew oppo rtuni t ics for cont inuin g th e strug gle gainst evil in

which hum a ns are present ly engaged.

An

almo st inevitable acco m panim ent

of

the evolutionary struggle,partic-

ularly

as

manifest

in

the hum an species,

is

suffering.

I t

is

significant, I be-

l ieve, that m ore and m ore efforts have been m ade

to

sh o w

that

a

G od int i-

mately invoIved

in

the crcative process

m u s t be a

“suffering G0d.”52 Again,



lwmortal i ty:

A

Pragmatic-Processille Model

227

therefore, any cxtrapolatcd ncw life cannot exclude thc possibility of suffer-

ing in som e form .

Thcrc remains the qu est ion of “loss” as i t m ight pertain to a ny new l ife.

Perhaps thc m ost crucial aspect

of

this question has to do w ith th e loss

of

everlasting union with the divine. Since

I

havc alread y extrapolated

a

con-

tinuing strugg le after death, i t would follow that the achieverncnt of ever-

lasting union with the divine may depend o n actions that ar e’ n ot restricted

to “this

life.”

I t is because it is increasingly hard to beIieve that th e actions

of

most human

brings

in the time allotted them n this life are of such

a

nature

as to me rit them either cternal ifc o r eternal dam nation that thinkers such as

joh n Hick suggest a

succession

of l ives, whereby a co ntinu ing purification

will take place such that there

wil1

emerge individuals wor thy

of

the most

intimateunionwith

God.

Elsewhere, I

have

expressed my reservations

about Hick’s success ivc l ives th~ory~~- -heails, in

m y

j u d g m e n t ,

to

safe-

guard that individuality which I consider esscntial to significant personal

immortal i ty. Here I wish to take issue with ano the r aspect of his philosoph-

ical theology : n am ely,

his

affirmation of “universal salvation.”54 Finding the

idea of hell o r eternal suffering repu gn ant, H ick argu es hat the divine love is

such that all will eventually be saved, tho ug h so m e may have to und er go

a

succession o f

a

greater

numbcr

o f lives than others in or de r to achieve ade-

quate self-purification.

T h e question that mu st be aised here is wh ether the doctrine of niversal

salvation, highIy motivated tho ug h it may

be,

does not dimin ish the “se-

riousness” of human experience. While I d o n o t hink that hel lf ire and eter-

nal torment ought to

be

presented even as a possibility, I am not sure hat in

order to avoid them

we must

assert that all hu m an bein gs

will

necessarily

be

united with God in

a

un ion of joy fu l immediacy. At stake here, of course, is

the nature and scope of

h u m a n

f reedom. W ithout even touching

upon

the

numerous subtle issues related to

this freedom, let me simply sugge st that

there is a pro fou nd difference between a

h u m an

freedo m wh ose exercise

mrrst lead to union with God and one that llows for the possibilityof eternal

separation from God. This in

no

way rules ou t

the

possibility that all hu-

mans will eventually be united with each other within the depth s of the

divine life-indeed, this should be o u r h o p e . I t would seem, however, that a

world in which there can only be winn ers s a less serious w orld than one n

which the possibility of

the

deepest loss is real. From

a

perspective such as

Hick’s, the goal

is

assured; the only qu est ion is ho w lon g an individual will

take to reach it-as

if

God has said to us, “You’rego ing t o kee p do ing it i ll

you get i t r ight.”

Hence,

while I think that Hick has advanced

a

very

sug-

gestive and su pp ort ab le hypothesis-namely, that the process of creating

ourselves and thereby m ov ing closer to God m ust cont inue beyond “this

life”-he has unnecessarily weakened and soften ed it by assertin g that the

finat

goal is preset an d certain to

be

reached. Hell-understood as th e ever-

lasting separation

of

the individual from the divine cen ter

of

love-must

rema in a live option for radically free hu m an beings.



Concluding

ReJections



No,

I

shall not die, I shall live

to reci te the dceds of Yahweh;

though Yahwch has punishcd me of ten ,

he has not abandoned me t o Dca th .

”Psalm 118:17-18

S o m e

suppose

that this post-natal

life

where

all we have

is time, is fetal life,

is where

as

wc bounce and f lex

i n

t i m e

o u r

years

of

moons change u s

into

beiugs viable not here

but somew here a t tent ive . Suppose,

b o r n e d o w n o n ,we are birthed

in to a universe where love’s not crazy;

and that split out

of

time

is

death in to

a

m e d i u m w h e r e

love

is

the elerncnt we c ry

o u t to

breathc,

big love,

gencral

as air

hcre,

specific as breath.

“ M a r i e Ponsot

“The Great Dead, Why

N o t ,

M a y K n o w ”



Fro m the available evidence, it w ou ld appear that immortality bclief and

terminality belief have been present in varying degrees

of

explicitness and

with shif ting degrees of dom inanc e f rom the daw n of hum an conscious-

ness. I t is interesting to note that in s ome of the earliest religious literature,

it

is

death rather than imm ortal l ife wh ich

is

seen as the destiny

of

hum an

beings. In response to Gilgamesh’s poignant but fruitless search for immor-

tality, the Ale-wife informs him:

The

life thou pursuest thou shalt not find.

W hen the gods c rea ted m ankind ,

Death

for

mankind they set aside,

Life in th eir own hands retaining.’

Her advice

to

him is echoed latcr in Ecclesiastes, where we are told:

This, then, is my conclusion: the right happiness for man is to eat and

dr ink

and be content with all the w ork he has to do under the sun , dur ing the few

days God

has

given h i m t o

Iive, since this

is

the

lot assigned

him.

. . . What-

ever

work you propose to d o , d o i t while you

can, for

there is neither achieve-

ment ,norplanning,norknowledge ,norwisdom inSheolwhereyouare

going.3

Contemporary express ions

of

such sent iments are numerous , of course,

but what dis t inguishes them, perhaps, is that they emerg e out of and over

against

a

culture that for m ore than tw o thousa nd years

was

saturated w ith

the belief that “this life” was the pa thw ay to an oth er ife and that the way in

which nd ividuals ived“here and now ” would determine the qual i ty of

their

lives

“he reafte r.” Th is belief was articulated in bo th

the

philosophical

and religious traditions in su ch fashion that both the “ratio nality ” and the

existential meaning

of

hu m an life were organical ly bound

up

with a belief in

and a hope f o r som e m ode of its continuan ce beyon d the grave. It

is

this

belief and perspective w hic h, as

was

noted

at

the outset, has

been

rendered

radically problematic by mo dern and contem porary thoug ht and experi-

221



tion in order to realize tho se son lcw hat tenu ou s aspects of rcligious cxperi-

ence that secm no t

to be

covered by sclf-deception.

While

I

concede that

the

danger

of

sclf-deception appears to be greater

for

the religious believer, I stron gly reject a n y su gg est ion that self-deception is

exclusively

a

feature of religious belief. Rather, the cvidcnce would seem to

indica te that it is

a

characteris tic of the hu ma n cond it ion in

a

variety

of

its

modes .

1s

it so clear that Nietzsche with his doctrinc of the overm an, Marx

w ith his prediction of

a

near-Utop ian rnillcnnium , and Freud with his

hopes

for psychoanalysis were completely free of self-deception? I f it is possibly

self-deception to believe

that

ou r lives may not

be

totally extinguished at

death,

is

it

no t also possibly self-deception-wishful thin kin g, an illusion-

to believe that we

can

build a

world

in wh ich hum ans wi ll

lead

contented,

fulfilled lives, fully aware that they will absolutely cease to

bc

after

a

brief,

f leet ing moment

of

existence?

Self-deception, then, might properly

be

called a “two-edged sword,” and

anyone ref lecting on im m or ta l i t y o r erminali ty must constantly keep bo th

edges in mind.

A

few brief

examples

will serve to concretize this point. The

religious believer, w ho qu i te or rect ly notes the extent

o

which many of the

best

values

o fh u m a n

culture

arederived

f rom

religious expcricncc,

is

tempted to argue, incorrect ly , that re l igion

s

the on ly logical and cxistcntial

gr ou nd fo r these values. Those w h o reject religion will concede that histor-

ically these values w ere associated with relig ion, b ut will co nten d that they

could be maintainedwithout fear of loss if religionwere to disappear.

Hence, the possibility that we are still living off the “fat” o f religion is not

seriouslyentertained.But

i t

o u g h t to be,for as on e thinker renchantly

expressed it: “Perha ps

all

o f us . . . are l ike children of r ich men w h c live

unknowingly

OK

a

still sum ptuou s inheritance (while

we

think it already

exhausted). Perhaps we are going to leave our descendants a

misery

far

deep-

er than

we

can

O r consider the all to o accurate c hargc that imm ortal i ty bclief is an un-

edifying effort to escape the

harsh

reality

of

death,g

and as

a consequence

our responsibilities

for

the present state

of

the human condi t ion are great ly

diminished.

On

the o th er ha nd , the belief that death is absolutely final has

an

escapist dimension as well, as Ham let suggests:

To die--to sleep-

No

more;

and

by

a

sleep

to

say

we end

The heart-ache and

the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to ,-“ t is

a

c o n su m m a t i o n

Devoutly

to be

wish’d. (Hamlet 3 .1 )

If

im m orta l i ty belief has its mode of consolat ion, cannot

the

belief that our

responsibility ceases totally with our deathcarry

with

it a consolation

of

its

o w n ?

The

belief

that

our

life

is

not

comp letely terminated

at

the

grave

does

not

in itself assure o r exclude rcsponsibiiity; hence , we might reasonably



claim thc p ossibility of i ts deepening this responsibility. T he gr ou nd s for

such an

extrapolation are located in the experiential fact that rcsponsibility

for our actions usually extends beyond the mo me nt-wc arc responsib le for

the future consequences

of

ou r acts

as

well as for our past actions.

Is

i t not

plausible, then, that we might be rcsponsible i n some new life for the way

in

which

wc are

now living, and wo uld not such consciousness lend a depth

and significance to o u r present actions?’o

N E E D S AND

VALUES

We

have considered James’s insistence on taking seriously those needs in

response to whichreligions have em erge d. Th ere is

n o

claim, of course, that

a

feIt need

for

salvation or mmortality “proves” thereality o r even the

possibility of salvation o r im m or tali ty. T he m os t tha t is claimed is that

a

need or nceds that have been widespread and persistent cannot be dismissed

out of

hand.

If,

of course, one

is

persuaded that those heeds which have

from theearl iest momcnts of humanconsciousness to thepresentbeen

expressed i n various nmdcs o f religion-ranging then and now from benig n

to

destructive, from insightful to frivolous,rom umanizing to de-

humanizing-that hoseneeds are nothing but modes of self-deception,

then every effort

should be made

to

expose them

as

such and

to

replace them

with more constructivc needs. If, however, one believes that such needs, in

spite of their often horrend ous ma nifestations, areexpressive

of

that dirnen-

sion of

the human self

which

opens i t

to

the deepest rcsonanccs of reality,

then one

must

bend one’s efforts towa rd the red irection of those nceds and

the reconstruction

of

the modes in w hich they arc exprcssed.

We may not bc as confident today as James was that “immortality is one

of the great spir itual needs of m an ” ( H I , 2), but neither can we be certain

that it is

not.

Having surrendered certainty either way,

I

have been attem pt-

ing to suggest that such belief s a worthy, desirable, and hence “reasonable”

belief. It is a reasonab le belief if

it docs

not involve the loss of impor tan t

values and has the possibility of realizing some values that otherwise wo uld

be lost. If on e avoids o r minimizes the escapist temp tation that often ac-

compan ies belief in imm ortality , i t is hard to see just wh at im po rtant values

would be lost through suc h belief. I have sugg ested that quite possibly im-

mortality-believers might be spur red to

work

harder even for those

values

that are

at

the center o f th e ives

of

secular

humanists-more hu m an e politi-

cal, economic, and social structures, for example.

Detailing the distinctive values that m ig h t be gained by immortality belief

is more

difficult. Perhaps the m os t tha t an

be

claimed, and it

s

not a modes t

claim, is that all the values associated with h u m a n life thereby take

on a

greater depth and richness. An d perh aps the mo st crucial value is that of th e

human person.

A

central feature of this essay has been the construction of a

model of the h u m a n person constitutcd in part by its relation

to

a

transcen-

dent person , G od. have maintained that

a

view of theperson as

open

to

the



possibility of a life con tin uo us w ith everlasting divine life

is

a richer view

than on e that restricts the real ity of th e person t o visible spatio-temp oral

parameters.

The

key

valu e gain ed by im m ortality elief, then , is inseparablc fro m that

transcendent dimension of reality traditionally symbolized s “God.” Expe-

rientially, Jamesm ainta ins, he reality

of

G od m eans“the presence of

‘promise’ in the wor ld . ‘God r no God?’means ‘promise o r

no

promise?’”

( M T , 6). Elsewhere, he suggests that

belief

in God “changes the dead blank

it

of

the wor ld into a living thou, with whom the whole man may have

dealings”

( W B ,

101). Now 1 am no t argu ing th at the values related to belief

in

the

divine are logical ly inseparable from im m orta l i ty belief , b ut

I

am

suggesting that those values tak e

o n

a dis t inct ive dimension when weelieve

that we have more than

a

m om en tary rol e to play in their realization. Take

the value o f “love,” for example. O f coursc, this may be nothing m ore

han

a hu m an em oti on or activi ty that emerges from hu m an experience and is

restricted in its m ean ing and reality to this expe rience. Let us assume,

how-

ever, that human love is a continuation and specification of

a

more encom-

passingprinciplewhich, given our processive world, is endeavoring in-

creasingly to incarnate itself.’ N ow im m ort ali ty belief is no t necessary for

believing pa rticipation in this principle

of

love-indeed,

I

will shortly

sug-

gest that, paradoxically, the m ost fruitful participation would seem to ex-

clude undue focusing on person al imm ortality. N evertheless, the possibility

that our participation in this everlasting principle of love is mo re than mo-

mentary does tend

to

disting uish it from participation in which the lasting

fruits of all love activity are retained by this principle alone.

O n e of the mo st impo rtant fruits associated with the belief in personal

immortal i ty is that of a moral universe. Note, I say “moral universe,”

no t

“mo ral order ,”

and

w ith this distinction

I

am diverg ing somewhat f rom

James’s usage for, as

we

saw earlier, Jarncs m aintained that ethics has “ a s

genu ine and real a foothold in a universe w here the highest consc iousness s

human, as in

a

universe where there is a God as well” ( W B , 150). Nev-

ertheless, James con tend ed that in the absence of faith in God, human beings

will not be ene rgize d to their full potential. T h er e is no question, then, that

James recognizes

a

significant difference between

a

universe in which

God

and person al mm ortality are realities and on e from wh ich they are

ex-

cluded. Following James, in part,

I

wish

to

acknow ledge the possibility

of

morali ty within the second kind of universe but insist that it will be re-

str icted to a dim ensionof this universe, w he rea s in the first kind of universe,

morali ty would in some sense flow fro m its de pth nd center. Given this real

difference,

I

think it proper

to

describe a universe involving God and per-

sonal imm ortal i ty as a “moral universe.” A universe in wh ich these realities

were absent could quite proba bly be said

to

I ’ N V O I V P a “moral order”

but

no t

to be

a

“m oral univcrse.” I t is qui te

possible

that morality

is solely a

creation

of

h u m a n

beings and

that

it

takes place within

a

nonmoral universe.



C o n c l u d i q Rejectiorlr 227

O n e of the control l ing assumptions

f

this essay has been that he classical

claim that reality

s

rational has been radically un de rm ine d by the thought and

events

of

the mod ern and contemporary wor ld. T h e world, as Nietzsche,

Sartre,

C a m u s ,

and oth ers conte nd, may be essentially meaningless and ab-

surd so

that our incorrigible longings

or

just ice, p a c e , harm ony, and ife arc

doomed to utter frustration. Pragm atism, as has been indicated, strives to

form an alternativeposition-onewhichdenies hat

a

world o f finished

rationalityand

one

of i r redeemableabsurdity are theonly alternatives.

Hence, we may believe that the world is becoming rational, moral, and that

the all to o evident feature of ab surd ity m ay eventually be overcome. A s has

been stressed, however, at this m om en t of hu m an volution i t is not possible

to

claim that these

are

more

than possibilities.

Thus

there can

bc

no decisive

refutation of either the classical view that the un de rlying struc ture

of

the

world is finished and rational

r

the contemporary viewhat the wo rld

s

to its

core, and eternally, absurd.

JUSTICE

AND

COMPENSATION

One

o f the earliest spu rs to belief in persona l imm ortality was

the

evident

fact of injustice in the w or ld.

I f

death ends

a l l ,

then th ere can be no question

of

“justice” in

thc

very

basic

sense

of

each individual’s receiving his

or

her

due. As no ted in Ecclesiastes, “This is th e evil that inheres

in

all that is done

under the

sun:

that one fate com es

to all.”

Yet one of the long-standin g

contentions of

much

of philosophy and rcligion is that “one fate” does no t

await us all. l 2 It is a dcep-scated, almo st instinctive repugn ance for such a

view that has led philosophers in the nam e

of

rationality, m oralists in the

name

of morality,

and

theologians in

thc

n a m e of

God

to argue for

the

reality of a life in which

a

m or e equitable participation in the goods

of

real-

ity would bc reahzed.

I t

is not being sug gested, of

course,

that belief

in

personal immortality

“proves” that w e live in a m ora l universe. I t is suggested that belief in per-

sonal immortality is b o u n d u p with belief in

a

m ora l universe. Surely, the

over w he lm ing num ber o f

h u m a n

beings now living and the biliions w h o

have lived can hardly be said to reflect in their allotted lives an yth ing

ap-

proaching justice.Even if those of us w h o have been mo re for tunate an

say

that in spite of everything we have been treated justly, it wo uld sure ly

be

rash

i f not ar rogant

for

us

to

suggest

that the same holds

for

others. In the

absence of personal mm ortali ty, hen, here is noavoiding theexisten-

tialist’s co nte ntio n that the w orl d is

absurd

and that morality is

a

charac-

teristic-and a most tenuous one-of a small part of reality.

Now

whether

o r not we live in a moral universe,

one in

wh ich justice will ultimately

prevail, th e desire for such

a

wo rld is a wo rrhy one and-absent com pell ing

evidence

that

such

a w orld is impossible-a reasonable on e. Thus , if person-

al immortality is necessary to

a

mora l universe, then it too is a wor thy and

reasonable belief.



228 Cortcludirrg RefIpctiorls

H av ing said this, and believing it to

be

true in some sense, I remain un-

easy-it

scerns

too imple , too neat, too reasona ble”when reflected

against thc dark unde rside of human experience.

I f

there is a deep repug-

nance to the notion that there

is

no u ltimate justice, there has also em erge d,

particularly in the modern era,

a

repugnance to the notion that the poo r and

oppressed

will

be “com pensa ted” for their sufferings

in

ano ther l ife. H ere

again w e are co nfro nted with an instance of that existential dialectic de-

scribed earlier. Immortality bclicf should not eradicate those experiential

absurdities that i ts adherents share with theerminality-believers, in spite

of

theconflictingconcep ts, nterpretations,and beliefs thatarise fro m this

shared experience.

There is

a

serrse

in wh ich there are sufferingsand evils that ca nn ot

be

compensated for, here or hereafter. Consider the

suffering

of inn oc ent chil-

dren-what “divine plan” could ever justify such suftering?

W h y

d o we feel

offended,

w h y

d o

w e feel that their sufferings

have

been trivialized, w he n

we hear som eo ne glibIy say, “It’s all right; they are

in

heaven n o w ” ? Yet are

we any less ogen ded ,

do

their sufferings seem an y less trivialized, w he n w e

hear it said that “thin gs will be better for

future

hum an i ty”? As noted ear-

lier, there is

a

sense in wh ich silerlce seems to be the only appropr iate re-

sponse

to

so m e deeds, but neither the terminality-believer

nor

the irnrnor-

tality-believer can rest con tent perm anen tly with s ilence. We

must

respond,

undoubtedly i n “ fear and t r e r n b h g , ”

but we

must

respon d, a nd the diver-

sity of responses gives rise to our divergent concepts and eliefs. i 4

Let me hin t at the direction I th ink

a

response consistent with the assump-

tions and concerns

of

this essay mig ht take. Ho w might

we

acknowledge

that

some

sufferings defy “compensat ion” and at the same t im e avoid ren-

dering them completely meaningless? Suppose we are involved

and

incor-

porated within

a

gr ow th process along the ines

I

have described. Th e strug -

gles and sugering s o f everyone involved help to move the process to an even

higher and richer process;

as

we are all contr ibutors to the growth

of

this

process, we

share

in bo th its sufFerings and its joys-thoug h not all equally

nor s imultaneously, s ince w e en ter in

an

indefini te number of different mo-

ments and develop

a t

widely varying rates. Suffering an d loss, then, are the

prices all participants pay, including God, for the creating

of

the wo r ld . l 5

How, then, is th is not “compensat ion”

or

our sufferings? Well, of course, in

a

sense it is , but we m igh t call i t “creative com pe nsa tion ”

to

distinguish it

from “extr insic com pensation.’’

What might his mean ? I am, needless to say, reachinghere, but I am

at tempt ing to extrapolate a possible mode of l ife, however transformed,

from available experience. For exam ple, supposing somc young man’s legs

are horr ibly burne d in

a

thcater

fire

for wh ich the building’s own er

was

responsible. T he o w ne r pays this you ng man

a

large sum

of

money, corn-

pensates h im . Th e young m an or someone close to him m igh t say, “No

am oun t

of

money

can

ever com pensate for the pain and suffering he has



undergone.” Let

us

call this “extr insic comp ensation.” N ow im ag in e that

the you ng ma n is deterrnincd to ovc rcom e his hand icap, and throug h per-

sistent effort he is no t on ly able to regain the

usc

o f his legs

but

in s o do ing

develops into

a

world-class runncr.

I b

I

w ou ld call this “creativc compensa-

tion” and view it as the cxpc riential gro und for the extrapo lation f the way

in

which su fferings, irrcducibly

absurd

and rneaninglcss in the n~ selv cs, m ay

possibly acquire meaning by their role in th e crcative process. l 7

N o w one might objcct a t this point that if this is the best ar gu m en t that

can

be

constructed for “creat ivc com pensation,” i t highlights thc poverty

of

argum ents or personal im m orta l i tyw he n faccd with heenormity of

human suffering.

I

would not for

a

m o m e n t

deny

this, but what arc our

alternatives? Sup pose thc totality o f th e lives o f th o se

who

have undergone

profoundandundescrvcd suffering areabsolutely erminatedwith heir

deaths. Is this any m or e palatable, any m ore “just ,” than if somehow thcrc

were

a

Go d able to “save” thcir pcrsonal centers

so

that their ho rrible suffer-

ing wou ld no t have been the whole of thcir life?

I

have already cxprcsscd my

view that what would be scanda lous would bc

a

G od w ho had the power

to

savc them withou t thcir having und ergon e such suffering but for whatever

reasons failed to allcviatc their pain. B u t a suffering God who is intimately

bo un d up w ith the suffering

of

hum ans ,

who

is

“saving ” them in thc

ordy

way possible, is another matter. Of course, n o such G o d may exist , and our

faith may be a dec cptive illusion-this possibility has been repeatedly con-

ceded. I f such a God did exist, however, hc wo uld hardly be reprehensible;

hence, one’s fai th would no t be mo rally repug nan t, n or wo uld the hop ehat

those w h o havc endurcd such ntense and “senseless” suffering m igh t in

some mysterious way be “com pcnsatcd” through

a

t ransformed mod e of

existence within

t h c

div ine life.

Allied

to

thc com pensation o bjection

to

belief in pcrsonal im m or tali ty

is

the con tentio n that suc h belief oEers an unacceptable consolation

for

the

pain and suffering that inevitably accompanies hu m an life.

I

earlier

dodged

this objection

by

rejecting any faith thatserves as a “means to strperjcinl

consolation.” I t seems foolish, however, and p atently untrue to experience,

to de ny that even the kind of rig or ou s faith for which

I

am calling may give

rise to some m o d c of consolation. T h c only poin t would insist upon is that

consolation may ncvcr be dircctly sought, thatfaith m us t never be

a

deliber-

ate o r conscious mea ns to achieve the

end

of

consolation.

If

consolation docs

accompanyfaith, it mu st com e as a grace. As such, of course, t is

not

inevitablc,

a n d one

ma y indced believe yet rcceivc little or no conso lation.

Indeed, I wou ld sugges t that nothing

should

m akc th c believcr more wary

of

the authenticity

of

his or her faith than an excess of conso lation.

Another charge against thc propriety of im m ort ali ty bclief m ust be ac-

knowledged-a charge prevalent a t least since thc Enlightenm ent-that to

believe in pcrsonal immortality

is to be

mired in an ou tmoded, primit ive

rewards-and-punishments version

of

morali ty that is demeaning to and un-



w or thy of ma ture hum an being s. This charge has bo th sccular and religious

expressions: the first is encapsulated in the m ax im “V irtu e is its o w n re-

ward,” and the second in “God must be loved for his own sake.” In both

perspectives the implication is that

to

low

G o d

o r

serve

our

fellow bcings

became

such actions will red ou nd to ou r cred it manifests a crass and super-

ficial egotism. Since

a

crucial claim of th e later p art of this essay has been

that immortal i ty belief is pragmatically eficacious, I m us t again takc refugc

in paradox-a pa rad ox , however, w hic h is at thehear t of all religious

expenencc.

Prescinding from hepsychologicalcornplcxity,perhaps mpo ssibil i ty,

involved,

I

w ou ld insist that believers in persona l imm ortality should not

love and serve G o d o r heir fcllow beings

became

they will be rewarded, here

or hereafter, for such love and service. l 8 This would secm to

bc

the insight

a t the heart of “lo singone’s sou l in ord cr to find i t .” A simplistic m eans-end

relation appears inadequate to w ha t is being coun seled. If we

seem corn-

pelled to recognize a dimens ion of unwor th inessattached to serving others

in

order

that

we be person ally rewarded-secularly or religiously-we also

seem compelled to recognizc that an enh anced quality of life oftcn does

result from disinterested service to others.

The

lesson the imm ortality-bc-

liever m ust dra w is that thoug hts

of

a

new

life ou gh t no t

to

be

the primary

focus o f and motivation for their actions.

9

G od an d ou r ellow beings otrghr

to be loved for their o w n sakes an d no t for any enefits that mig ht accrue to

us personally. T h e dedicated terminality-believer, therefore, will serve as a

challenge to the authen ticity o f th e mmortality-believer’s life an d in a sense

may even

be a

model for it. Immortality-belicvers must not makc theirdedi-

cation and co ntr ib utio n to

the

bct ter ing of t he hum an com m uni ty and t he

world dependen t upon their assurance of

imm ortal i ty. The ir t rust in the

divine benevolence m us t

be

such that if their

egos

are the price

to

be paid

for

the advancement of the S pirit, so be it. Th is, of course, does not exclude

their believing and ho pin g that the go od ne ss of G od is such that all will be

graciously enabled

to

share in the fruits of the Sp irit to whose lifc all have

contr ibuted.

An allied parad ox is that wh ile belief in personal im m ort ali ty gives mean-

ing

to ou r l ives, we shou ld not so believe in ord er to give m eanin g to a

meaningless life. Belief in personal immortal i ty should not be the sourceo r

cause

of a

me anin gful life; rather, heexperienced worthwhilcnessand

meaningfulness o f life itself should give rise to the hope for co ntinu ing life.

It is n o t because his life is so bad hat we mu st seek me aning for t in

an oth er life. It is because life is so good that we desire to extend, deepen, and

enrich it without limit.20

T h e

ambiguous,

cloud ed character of the hum an con dit iont the m om en t

is such that, a t bes t, bo th im m ortality elief and terminality belief are mo des

of

a

holding act ion unti l “the gods return.” Th e hum anist ic imm ortali ty-

beIievers cannot but acknowledge the poverty

of

their articulations, and the

elusiveness an d am big uity of the experiences from wh ich these articulations



emerge. T h e humanistic terminality-believers cann ot but ackn ow ledge the

gap betwcen the idealized hu m an ity

of

the Enlighten mcn t-whether in its

subseq uent Nietzsch ean, M arxian, o r Deweyan expressions-and the gen-

crality

of

hum an b eings. B oth m ust believe and hope that wc are in transi-

tion to

a

n e w m o d e of hum an consciousness . Thc former will believe that

this new mo de will make the divine dimensionof reality more evident and

vital. T h e latter will believe

a n d

ho pe that the

ncw

m o d e of consciousness

will achieve en o ugh self-sufficiency

to

effcctivcly o verco me the long-stand -

ing need for transcendcnce. Bo th m ust live to the f ~ ~ l l e s tn accordance with

their respective beliefs and interpretations of their necds. Neither, o f course,

will believe that thcsc

are

merely their individual or g r o u p

needs,

and they

will thereforc strive

to

persuad e the others hat the best

of

wh at these others

seek is found in the oppo sing bclief fram ew ork. Each g ro up l iving

s o

will

test out their bcliefs

s o

that, over the long run , wh at is w orth y

of

survival

will survive.

T h e

terrninality-believers m ig ht co m e

to

an awareness

of a

depthand reality accom pany ing heirexperience hat is no longer ade-

quatelyaccounted or

in

m er chum an e r m s .

T h e

immortality-believers

might come

to

realize tha t their bclief in an en con lpassin g perso nal rcality

with which their lives are continu ous was but

a

primitive projection of the

best in the hum an com mu nity and that the posi t ive possibil it ies o f such

belief can now

be

lived witho ut the early sym bols by wh ich i t was ex-

pressed.

REPRISE

We have seen that the classic criticism of bclief in im m o rta lity is its alleged

deen ergizing ch aracter, i ts turning individu als away f ro m th e difficult tasks

at handand ocusing heirattentionandenergies in an illusory“other

world.”21

I

believe that

a

pragm atic extrapo lation along the lines suggested

offers analternative to such

a

l ife-denying i~ n m o rt a li ty elief. I t does so

because, if con sisten tly acte d up on, it intensifies the prese nt efforts to trans-

form the world in wh ich we find ourselves. Furthcr, any future participation

in the “ new ” hum an com m uni ty will be significantly, though

not

neces-

sarily exclusively, de ter m ine d by theway we live and act in ou r presen t span

of

l ife. Hence, such belief in immortality does not divertour energies from

“this life”; rather, it intensifies th e m by aw akening us to the depth, scope,

and seriousness belon ging to “this

life.”

Since

a

n e w c o m m u n i t y o r n e w

world or new reality is “here and n o w ” in the

process

of being created,

and

since we are imp ortant- thou gh not necessari ly the only-participants in

this creative process, th e value

of

o u r present efforts

is

immeasurably in-

creased.

Inasmuch

as th e

sole

pathway to

any

ne w life is thro ug h “this li fe,”

any escapist beliefs o r activities that fantasize an already realized a nd corn-

pleted paradise

to

which

we

will leap are profoundly antithetical

to

authen-

tic belief in im m ortality .

In

the inal analysis,

of

course, hepragmaticperspective ssumed

throug hou t this

essay

insists that belief o r fai th is not knowledge, and there



232

C o n d r r d i q Reflec t iom

is n o guaran tee that imm ortality-bclicf, o r any other belief, is not illusory.

T he risk of bclief is inevitablc, and no reflective p erson can avoid it o r trans-

fer it to

a

surroga te, u-hcthcr that surrogate is called tradition, thc Chu rch,

the Biblc,

or

God. T h e

emphasis

upon persona l responsibility is

on ly

fit-

ting, given that what is a t stake

is

personal im m ortality . Bu t since thc person

is relational

o r

communal as well as individual, there is no suggestion here

of any isolated, self-enclosed, egotistic, and merely ‘m en ta l belief activity.

Indeed, unless belief in im m or tali ty gives

rise

to s om c evident existential

fruits for both he nd ividualand hccommunity,pragmatic evaluation

would

be

compelled to conclude that this belief is m erely notional-a hol-

low

relic left over from an earlier

age.

Inasmuch

as

l iving belief neve r occu rs within

a

historical and cultural

vacuum, we may not minim ize the formid able obstacles to belief in immor-

tality within our presen t context. But neither should wc s uccum b to t hem

because we are unable

to

fashion ar gu m en ts that will completely neutralize

theseobstacles. Fashion arg um en ts we must ,bu t they shouldreinforce,

deepe n, and enrich rather than substitute for othcr hum an activities. Para-

doxically, the best argum ents produ ced by any believing co m m un ity, in-

cluding perhaps thcscientific com m un ity, have always led to m yste ry rather

than dernystificat ion, ex panding

o u r

sense

of

awe

and won der instead

of

explaining

it

away. Eve n hebestarg um ents , however, never initiate o r

create life or belief.

0 x 1 1 ~

here there is

a

com mu nity already energized by

vital belief stcrnming from

a

mysterious and irreducible experiential dcpth

have there em erged those wh ose cflections have served

to

suppor t , to mod-

ify,

to

expand, and a t times to trivialize or destroy the originating belief or

faith . T ho se w ho choose the path of reflective believing cannot know,

a

priori,

which of these may

result from

their reflections.

All

we can kno w,

with some degree

of

confidence

is

that

a

belief in immortality which lacks

either personal and com mu nal frui ts or reflective support has already lost its

very reason

for

being-the deepe ning and expan sion o f life.

O n e last poin t . Belief in imm ortal i ty shou ld not isolate those w h o es-

pouse it from others who also believe in the need to wo rk towa rd

the

cre-

ation o f a richer andmore humane comm uni ty . These l a tt e r o d d inc lude

a

variety

of

Marxist and humanistic believers who

also

maintain that no sig-

nificant a n d desirable future is possible unless

a

con tinuing effort on the part

of

an increasing number

of

human

beings is made

to

“change the world”

as

it is pres en tly con stitute d. Th ou gh th e bclief structures that energize those

endeavoring to createabetter worldwill nv olv e m po rtan t differences,

which ought not be minimized, they should not be

in,

superficial cornpeti-

tion with each other. O n l y by a shared effort to realize c on ve rgen t goals and

values will an atmosphcre emerge for a more fruitful dialogue concerning

dive rgen t beliefs-beliefs o f such magn itude and scope that what is at stake

is literaliy a matter

of

death

and

life.22



Notes

and

Index



NOTES

I N T R O D U C T I O N

1. John Hcrm an Randall , Jr ., T h e

Role

ojK~nowledger l Westem Religiorr (Boston:

Starr King

Press, 1958), 140

ee also Randall’s

Nu t u r c u r d H i s t o r i d

Expcrierrce ( N e w

York:

ColumbiaUniversi ty

Press,

1958),

269-70

(hereafter,

N H E ) :

“Intellectual

cons istency betw cen ‘scientific’ and ‘religious ’ beliefs-if the latter are taken

as

giv-

ing

an

inteflectual explanationof anything-is a very greatvalue. B ut it s an intellec-

tual and philosophical valye, no t

a

‘religious’ value. ~ . . In any event, there

is

a basic

distinction between religious beliefs that are ‘fundamental,’ and perform a religious

function-that are religious symb ols-and those that give intellectual understand-

ing, that construe and interpret re l igious insight in termsf some particular philoso-

phy, and ad just it to the rest of man’s knowledge

and

experience. T h e latter beliefs

are the basis of a ‘rational’ o r ‘philosophical’ theology.”

2.

Cf.

SPP,

30:

“The ques t ion

of

being

is

the

darkest

in

all

philosophy.

A11

of us

are beggars here,

and

n o school can speak disdainfully

of

another or give itself supe-

rior

airs. For all of us alike, Fact forms

a

datum, gif t , or

vorge@ndener,

which w e

cannot burrow under, explain or

get

behind. I t makes itself somehow, and our busi-

ness

is far

more with i ts u h a t than with

i t s

w h c e

o r u,hy.”

3. John Dewey, “The Need for a Recovery in Philosophy,”

0 1 1

Experierrce, Na tu re ,

attd Freedom, ed. Richard]. Rernstein (N ew York: Liberal Arts Press, 1960),23.

4.

The hyphen ins t ead o f “and”s the connective heres deliberate and important,

since it emphasizes the distinctive versionof pragmatism’s “experience” as a transac-

tion between tw o poles of reality rather than

an

interaction betw een two essen tially

com plete and separate entities.

5. The Philosophy of -Al jed North Whitehead, ed. Paul Arth ur Sch ilpp (Ne w York:

Tudor,

1941),

645,

647-48.

6. A . N. Whitehead, Process arzd Reality NewYork: H umanit ies Press, 1955), 6.

7. A . N.Whitehead, Adventures ofldeas ( N e w York:Free Press/Macmillan,

1967),

8.

Cf . PU, 123: “All the wh ats as well as the thats of reality, relational as well as

228.

T h i s is

a

reissue of the

1933

edition.

terminal, are in the end c o n t e n t s o f i m m e d i a t e oncrete perception.’’

235



9. Ralph Barton Perry, The Thorcgkt nt ld Chnracteu

qf

WilliatnJmej, 2 vols.

(Boston:

Lit t le , Brown,

1935),

II:357 (hereafter TC).

10. See also V R E , 72-73: “If you have intuitions at all they come from a deeper

levcl of your naturc than the loquacious

evcl

which ra t ional isn~ inhabits .”

11. Cf. RichardStevens, J m t ~ c sm d Hlrsserl: The Fourrddiorzs of

M e m r i r ~ g

The

Hague: M artinus Nijhoff 1974),

37

(hereafter J H ) : “The task of achieving a fully

cohercnt network of Incarling is never finished, for w c n the most elaborate concep-

tual system always gives meaning only fro m a certain perspective, or from a limited

number of perspectives.”

12. Cf. Hans K iing, EtevtlaI L$e? trans. Edward Q u i n n (New York: D oubleday,

1984), 73-74: “A responsible decision of faith thus prcsupposes not a blind but a

justified belief in an eternal life; the per son

is

then not mentally ovcrpowcred but

convinced with the id

of

good reasons.” See also, the penultimate paragraph fJohn

Sm ith’s ine ntroduction to James’s Varieties of Religiorrs Experience: “Thebook

stands

as

a necessary co rrective to th e fideistic tendency manifested in the religious

thinking

of

recent decades, whichhas resulted in the encapsulation

f

religion within

the

walls

of sheer faith, w her e it s divorced f ro m any form of knowledge. James did

not accept that bifurcation” (p. li).

13.

Cf. Ian G. Barbour , A 4 p h ,

hfodels,

and Parcldignrs (New York:Harpe r Row,

1976), 123 (hereafter ALl4P): “ O n e cannot prove one’s most fundamental beliefs, b u t

one

can try to show how they funct ion in the interpreta t ion

f

expe rience.” Set: also

A r t h u r 0 Lovejoy, The Revolt Against Dtrnlisrtl (La Salle, 111.: O pen C ou r t Publi sh -

ing ,

1960),398:

“Since ou r kn ow in g s characteristically concerned with beyonds, we

know by fa i th . Bu t no t all beyonds

of

wh ich we can frame ideas are the objects o f

faiths

for

which wc have motives equally persuasive, urgent,

r

irrepressible, equally

deeply rooted in our cognit ive const i tut ion, and equally reconcilable with one an-

other and with what-through our primary fa i ths in the real i ty

f

remembrance and

in the existence o f ot he r knowers-we believe to have been the constant and com-

mon

course

of

experience.” I t is worth noting that nei ther

f

these thinkers considers

himself

a

pragmatist .

14.

Ian G. Bar bou r, theolo gian and phys icist, has developed an exceptionally ac-

cessible viewpoint o n the re la t ion between science and re l igion. Thoug h

morc

con-

ceptually efinedanddeveloped,Barbour’sviews are str ikinglysimilar o hose

found within the pragmatic tradition. See in particular his hrihlP and

Zsscrcs

it/ Science

nrrd Religiatr

( N e w

York:

Harper Torchbooks,

1971).

15.

The impossibi l i ty of rationally grounding first principles is widely

held

by

twentieth-century thinkers. Godcl’s incom pletene ss theore m is often cited n

this

regard. Hans Jonas, no fr iend of irrationalism, has made the point in somewh at less

technical language: “If there

is

a

‘life

of

reason’

for man

(as distinct from the m ere

use o f reason), it can be chosen only nonrationaliy,as all ends m ust be chosen nonra-

tionally {if they can be chosen at all). Th is reason has no jurisdiction even ovcr t he

choice o f itself as a me ans. Bu t use of reason as

a

means, is com patible with any nd,

no

matter how irra t ional . This is

the

nihilistic implication in m an’s losing

a ‘being’

transcending the fluxof becoming”

(ThePhertomenon

ofLife [ N e w York: Dell, 19661,

47).

16. In “The Applicability of Logic to Existence,” Dewey m aintained that “exis-

tence apart

from

that of reflection is logicible, bu t no t logicired” Dewey a d His

Critics,

ed.

Sidney Morgenbesser [New

York:

The

Journa l of Philosophy,

19771,



519). I t first appe ared in thejorrrrral o f P M o s u p h y

27,

no. 7 1930).For a similar point

made w ithin a vcry different philosophical context, see Friedrich Nietzsche, Tht

Will

to Power; trans.

W.

Kaufmann and

R .

j.

Hollingdale, ed. W. Kaufmann (New York:

Vintage

Books,

1967),

283:

“The

world scems logical to

us

because we have made

i t

logical.”

17. Cf. j o h n Dewey, The

i@ucrrce o jDu rwin ott

Philosophy (Bloomington: Indiana

University Press,

1965),

13 (hereafterID):Philosophy forswears inquiry after abso-

lute origins and absolute finalities n order to cx plore spec ific alues and thc specific

conditions that gcnerate them.”

18. Cf.Joh n Wild, The

Rndicnl Etrtpiricism of WiIliarrtJutnes

(New York: D oublcday,

Anchor Books, 1970),

388-89:

“Insuch facts therc is anelementofopacityand

‘m ystery ,’ as Jam es calls i t . No matter how fa r his know ledge of existencemay reach,

there will be furthcr dcyths beyond. Hence the radical em piricist should rccognizc

that in these concrete invcstigations, he is not conc erned with prob lem s that an ever

be

solved once and for all. H e is concerned ra thcr w ith mysteries into which he m ay

penetrate in various degrees, but which

he will

never

bc

ablc to exhaust. This mean s

that hc will put forth his ow n conc lusion s in tentative way, atte m ptin g a t

all

costs to

maintain that openness of mind which is o characteristic of Jam es.”

19.

For sim ilar notions by thinkers outside thc pragm atic tradition, cf. Joh n Hick ,

“Biology and hc Soul,” in Larpqge, Metuphysics, arid Death, ed.

John

Donne l ly

(New

York: Fordham Un iversity Press,

1978),

159: “We are no t here in the realm of

strict proof and disproof but

of a n

informal process of probing in

search

o f

a more

adequate conceptualization of the data.”See also Ralph Harper,

The

Existerrtial E x p -

rimce (Baltimore,

Md. :

Johns Hopkins’Universi ty Press, 1972),6: “ I t wou ld be wise

to think of existential thinking always as exploratory and provisional.”

20. Dewcy, ID,

194.

21. Cf.

James, cited in TC, I1:350: “T h e t ru th is what will survive the sifting-

sifting by successive generations and ‘on the whole.’ ”

22.

John Dewey, Experience u r d Nnfrrre (New York: Dovcr, lass),

7 .

Cf . WB, 12:

“The thinker starts

from

some experience of thepractical

world,

and

asks

its

mean-

ing. He launches himself upon the speculative

ea,

and

makes

a voyage long or short .

He ascends in to the empyrean , and com munes w i th the e te rna l essences . But what -

ever his achievements and discoveries be while gone, he utmost result they can issue

in

is

some new practical r n a s i m or resolve, or the denial of somc

old one,

wi th wh ich

inevitably he is soo ner o r later wa shed asho re on the

t e r m j r m a of

concrete life

again.”

23. Elizabeth Flower and Murray G. Murphey, A History ofPhilosoyIry

i n

Americn,

2 vols. (New York:

P u t n am, 1977),

II:682+

24.

Ralph

Barton Perry,

Itt

rhe

Spirit

o

Willinrn

Jntncs

(Ne w Ha ven, Co nn. : Yale

University Press,

1938),

203.

25.

In a letter

to

Arthur Lovejoy in 1907,Jamcs made thc following concession:

“Consequences of t rue ideas p e r

se ,

an d consequenccs of ideas

qlrn

believed b y

us,

are

logically different cons equc nces , and the whole ‘will to believe’ busincss has go t to

be re-edited w ith explicit uses made of the distinction” (cited in TC, 11:481).

26.

See also

P,

143:

“On

pragma tistic principles, if the hypothesis

of God

works

satisfactorily in thc wid est sens e

of

the wo rd, i t is true.

Now

whatever its residual

difficulties m ay be, experience

shows

that it certainly does

work, and

that the prob-

lem is to build i t out and de te rmine i t , so that i t wilI

cornbinc

satisfactorily

with

a11



238 No te s to Introdirctioti

the other working truths.” Cf. Morton White, Scierice G Sentiment in America (New

York: Oxford University Press, 1973), 205: “A holistic . . . conception of sci-

ence . . . emerges in those parts of Pragmatism in which he Uames] describes the

establishment of belief as a process in which we do not test opinions in isolation but

rather as parts of a whole stock of opinions.”

27. Louis Duprk, Trartscendetit Seljhood (New York: Seabury Press, 1976), 80.

28. Cf. Randall,

NHE,

198: “We never encounter the Universe, we never act to-

ward experience or feel being o r existence as ‘a whole.’

”

See also Karl Jaspers, Wa y

to

Wisdom, trans. Ralph Manheim (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1960),

43: “The world as a whole is not an object, because we are always in it and we never

confront the world as a whole. Hence we can not, from the existence of the world as

a whole, infer the existence of something other than the world. But this notion takes

on a new meaning when it is no longer regarded as

a

proof. Then metaphorically, in

the form of an inference, it expresses awareness of the mystery inherent in the exis-

tence of the world and of ourselves in it.”

29. Eugene Fontinell, “John Hick’s ‘After-Life’: A Critical Comment,” Cross Cur-

rents, Fall 1978, pp. 315-16.

30. It is important to stress that pragmatic extrapolation is rational, and while any

extrapolation, such as the one relating to immortality, may be unsuccessful and fall as

a result of critical analysis, it cannot be dismissed out of hand simply because it

points us

beyond the bounds of present experience or strict inferential reasoning.

Pragmatic extrapolation does not have the dimension of irrationalism apparent in an

affirmation of immortality such as Miguel de Unamuno’s. The similarities and con-

trasts between the two approaches cannot here be delineated, but one crucial dif-

ference is that the faith-reason relation in pragmatism does not have the fierce op-

positional character that it has in Unamuno. See his Tragic Sense ofLlfe, trans. J. E.

Crawford Flitch (New York: Dover, 1954), 114: “To believe in the immortality of

the soul is to wish that the soul may be immortal, but to wish it with such force that

this volition shall trample reason underfoot and pass beyond it.”

31. Barbour makes one further point supportive of the kind of pluralism espoused

by pragmatism: “In place of the absolutism of exclusive claims of finality, an ec-

umenical spirit would acknowledge a plurality of significant religious models with-

out lapsing into a complete relativism which would undercut all concern for truth”

( M M P , 8).

32. Plato scholar Henry G. Wolz has given what

I

would call a near pragmatic

description of extrapolation: “The outcome of an extrapolation can, therefore, be

said to be empirical in its origilz, transempirical in its nature, and, in as much as it may

serve as a norm or means of elucidation, once more empirical, namely, in itsfunction”

(Pla to and Heideggev:

I tt

Search

of

Seljhood

[Lewisburg, Pa.

:

Bucknell University Press,

19811, 132).

33. Whether an extrapolation is so “beyond” experience as to be invalidly discon-

tinuous with it is one of the matters not able to be decided in isolation from a range

and diversity of factors. Nietzsche, for example, concedes that his notion of the

overman is as much a conjecture as is the notion of God, but he considers the former

a valid conjecture, the latter invalid: “God is a conjecture; but I desire that your

conjectures should not reach beyond your creative will. Could you create a god? Then

do not speak to me of any gods. But you could well create the overman” ( T h u s Spoke

Zarathustra,

in

T h e Portable Nie tzsc he,

ed. and trans. Walter Kaufmann [New York:

Viking, 19681, 197).



Note s to Chapter 1 239

34. Throughout this essay, I will use the terms “immortali ty” and “resurrection”

interchangeably. In another context i t wou ld be im po rta nt to differentiate them, but

it is not crucial from m y perspective. I agree w ith Jo hn H ick that “if we posit the

reality of God, the difference between immortality and resurrection, as variations

within a theistic picture, becomes secondary” (Death arid Eterrzal LiJe [N ew York:

Ha rper Row, 19761, 181).

35. Th is classification is but a variation o f that given by Robe rt Jay L ifton in B o ~ t z d -

nries

(N ew Y ork: V intage Books , 1970), 21ff. , and

T h e LiJe o f t he

Self(New York:

Sim on Sch uste r, 1976), 32-34. For an earlier an d sim ilar version, see Co rliss La-

mont ,

T h e Illusiotz of lm mort al i t y

(N ew York: Frederick U ng ar, 1965), 22-23 (here-

after IZ).

36. For a biting dismissal o f wh at he calls “tho se shab by pseudo imm ortalities that

atheists and pantheis ts are forever proffering as substitutes for the real thin g,” w hich

is “personal imm ortal i ty ,” see Mart in Gardner, “Imm ortal i ty: W hy I A m N o t Re-

signed,” in T h e W h y s < fa Philosophical Scriuerzev (N ew York: Q uill, 3983), 280.

37. Cf. Lamont, I l , 251. After describing a nu m be r of such “ sym bolic interpreta-

t i on [~ ]” f imm ortal i ty and resurrect ion and conceding that for him they contain “ the

only tru th that imm ortali ty ideas ever had,” L am on t adds that these “abstruse redefini-

t ions o f imm ortali ty and the resurrection c annot be expected to have muc h emotional

efficacy or religious value. T he y w ill appeal he re and there

to

certain esoteric religious,

philosoph ic and esthetic group s, bu t for the great m asses of me n they will have little

significance.”

38. Be rtran d Russell, Mysticism and Logic

(London: Longmans, Green, 1921), 47-

48.

39. W. B. Yeats, “T he Song o f the H app y Sh epherd,” in T h e Collected Poems

o f

W.

B . Yeats (N ew York: Macm illan, 1956), 7.

40. Fyodor Dostoevsky, T h e Brothers Karamazov, t rans. Constance Garnet t (New

York: Modern Library, n.d.), 253.

41. C ited by Jacques C ho ro n in Death arzd Moderrz Mart (N ew York: Col l ier Books,

1972), 15.

42. Ralph Harper, The Existeirtial Experience (Bal t imore, Md. : Johns Hopkins

University Press, 1972), 69.

C H A P T E R

1

1.

John J. McDermot t , ed . , The Writirzgs

of

WilliarnJatnes (Chicago: University of

Ch ica go Press, 1977), xlv (hereafter WWJ.

2. These notes are reproduce d in Ralph B arton Perry,

T h e Th oug ht arid Character rf

Will iamJames, 2 vols. (Bo ston : Little, B ro w n, 1935),

11:365ff.

(hereafter TC).Need-

less to say, there is n o sug gestion here that James originated the notion o f “fields.”

Mary Hesse locates one source of field theory in physics in the work of the eigh-

teenth-century cosm ologist Ru ggie ro Bosco vich:

For Boscovich, “m atte r” is reduced to point particles having inertia but interacting

by distance forces of attraction and repulsion, whose magnitude depends on the

distance between the particles. . . . If attention is concentrated on the forces that

are exerted in space between the point masses, it is possible to regard these as in

some way constituting

a

med ium , thus “substantializing” the force field itself and

reducing the point masses

to

mere singularities in this field. This

was

essentially

the step taken by Michael Faraday in transforming Boscovich’s theory

into

field



theory

as

i t is unders tood in both classical and modcrn

physics.

(“Action

at

a

Distance

and

Field Theory,” in

The

E nqdoped i a o PPltilosoyhy, 8 vols . , cd. Paul

Edwards, [New York:Frce Press/M acmillan, 19671, I:11-12).

Since its origination in physics, the “field” co ncept has been employ ed

n

a variety

of

disciplines.

T h e

most notable and dcvcloped instancc, perhaps, is found in the w o r k

of Kurt

Lewin,

w ho p roduced a highly technical socid-psychological field theory.

For an insigh tful and sugg cstive use

of a field

metaphor , d rawn f rom physics ,

to

illuminate

the

nature

of

poetic and religious ecstasy, see Justus George Lawlcr, “Ec-

stasy: Towards a General Field Theory,” ] o c r n d q f f h f AJlJerirntJ

Acndemy

tIfRrligior~,

Dec.

1974, 605-1 3 .

3. Cf. Richard Stevens, J n r ~ e s

t d

Htrsserl: The Fotr~zdutiollsojMenrLirrg (Thc Hague:

Martinus Nijhoff, 1974),

129

(hereaf ter,JH ): “James discovered that the most primi-

tive data of the streamof consciousness are ‘sensible totals,’ i .e . , ensembles of sense

data which always present themselves in a focus-fringc pattern.” Stcvens

is

herc dis-

cussing James’s de scription of experience as it is presented i n The Prirlciyles qfPjycltol-

og y . I think i t evident that these “sensible tota ls” aren early version of “f ie lds .” T he

following text f r o m Stevens suggests a sim ilar cong eniality bctw ecn James’s field

language and his doctr ine of pu re exp erience:“The primordial field of pure experi-

ence

is a vagucly pre-structured flow

of

loosely-linked ‘sensible totals.’

No

totaiity is

ever complete

o r

sct f-enclosed. O n th is fundamen ta l l e d , the re

is

n o precise line of

demarcation w hich separates one sensible totality from ano ther”

JH,

4).

4. For an allied no ti on , cf. A .

N .

Whitehead

Aherlt lrres

ofIdeas

New

York: Frce

PresslMacrnillan, 1967),206: “ T h e univcrsc achieves its values by reaso n o f its

coot“

dination in to societies of societies, and into societies of societies of societies.:

5. John He rm an Randa ll , Jr . Nutwe n r d

His tor id

Expcriewe

(Ncw York:

Colum-

bia University Press, 195&),

133,

14611.(hereafter N H E ) .

6. Robert Pollock, “James:Pragma t i sm,” i n The

Greur

Books,

4

vols., ed. Harold

Gard inc r (N ew York:Devon-Adair, 1953), IV:197, 191.

7.

A . N. Whitehead,

Process and

Redi ty (New York: Hum ani ties Press ,

1955), 53

(hereafter

PR) .

8.

A . N. Whitehead,

Modes

of

Tllought (New York: Capr ico rn Books, 1958>,221.

Whitehead later adds : “We have to con st rue

he

world in te rm s of the bod i ly oc ie ty ,

and the bodily society in tcrms of thc gencral functionings of the world.

Thus,

as

disclosed in the fundamental essence

of

ou r experience, the

togetherness

of things

involves

some

doctrine of mutua l imm anence .

111

some sense or o ther , th is com mu-

nity of the actualities

of

the world mean s that each happening is a factor in the nature

of

every

other happening.

.

. .

We

are in the world and the world is in us” (pp. 225,

227).

9. John

Dewey,

Experieuce mrd Nutwe

(New

York:

Dover,

1958),

208 (hereafter

EN). Cf. Randall, N H E , 245: “ I t is not me rely organ ism s that can be said

to

‘re-

spond to st imuli ,’ that is , to respond

o

particulars

as

instances of ways rather than as

m ere particulars.’’

10.

jo hn Dewey, “Experiencc, Knowledge

and

Value,” in T h e

Philosophy ofjohn

Dewey,

cd.

PauI Arthur SchiIpp (New York:Tudor, 1951)’544.

11. j o h n Dewey, “In Defense

of

the T h e o r y o f Inquiry,” in On Experiencc, Ndtwe,

a d Freedofir, ed. Richard Bernstcin (New

York:

Liberal

Arts

Press, 1960),

135

(here-

after ENF).

12. john

Dewey,

Logic

(New

York: H e n r y Holt, 1938), 66-67 (hereafter L ) .



Notes t o C h a p t u 1

24 1

13. John Dewey and Arthur F. Bentley. Kmwing n r d t l w Ktrn~vt~ (Boston: eacon

Press,

1960),

e .g . , 67-69 (hereafter KK) .

14. Bernste in, Introduction, E N F , xl. Sec also Bernstein’sJohn D e w e y ( N e w York:

W ashington Square Press,

1967),

83:

“ F r o m

a

transactional perspectivc, an ‘elcment’

is a function al unit that gains its specific charac ter from the role that it plays in the

transaction. . . . A transaction does no t occ ur wi th an aggregate or combination of

elements that have independ ent existence.

On

the contrary, what counts

as

an ‘ele-

ment’ is depend ent

on

i ts func tion w ithin a tra nsactio n.” T hat this radical character

of

“interna l” chan ge is no t restricted t o macrosco pic rcalities

is

suggested by the

following:

“Thus

twentieth-century science has revolutionized many fundam ental

ideas of the nineteenth century; the a tom is not on ly much

more

complex than

Dalton [ the founder

of

chemical a tomic theory] thought; it is a lso much mo re

dy-

namic. . .

.

The m a in mis t ake of DaIton and other advocates o f essentially mecha-

nistic theories lay in the conviction that atoms did n ot un dergo any internalchange’’

(Andrew G.

M.

van Melsen, “Atomism,”

E t q ~ l o p e d i a

fPhilosophy, 1:197).

15.George R . Geiger,]ohn

Dewey

( N e w York: Oxford Univctsi ty Press,

1958),

17.

16.

Sec aIso Joh n Dewey, Expevierrce

n d

Educntiojr ( N e w York: Macmillan, 1956),

41 (hereafter EE): “Thestatem ent hat ndivid uals live n a

world

means, in the

concrete, that they live in a

series

of si tuat ions. And when it is said that they live

i n

these situations, the meaningof thc wo rd ‘in’

is

different

from

i ts meaning when i ts

said that pennics

are

‘in’

a

pocket

or

paint

is

‘in’

a

can.’’

For

a

useful com parison

of

Dewey’s “environment” and Alfred Schutz’s version

of

the Lebenstvelt, see Rodman

B. Webb, The Prese~tceOfthe Past (Gainesville: Univcrsity Presses o f Florid a, 1975),

40K

17.

John Dewey, Den to mcy a ~ dducation (N ew York: Macmillan,

1961),

47.

18. john Dewey, Hrrntan Natrrre m i o ~ d t r c t New York: M odern Library, 1930),

14,

16. For what can properlybe considered a field view related toJam es and particu-

larly Dewey, see Randali’s “Su bstan ce as a Coope ra t ion of Processes,” in N H E ,

142-

94.

Randal1 notes that w hat h e calls “Substance” can be called “the Field” (p.

14911).

He

later states: “Substa nce

is

wh at we today call ‘process.’

.

. .

M o r e

precisely,

Sub-

stance is encoun tered and kno wn as a complex of interacting and coo perating pro-

cesses, each exhibiting its o w n determ inate ways of cooperat ing, o r Struc ture” p.

152).

Given the rather broad sense in which

I

am understanding “field metaphysics,”

one could maintain that W hitehead has constructed the most systematic field rneta-

physics to date. His Process a d Reality is, needless to say,

a

thoroughly processive-

relational view o f reality. T w o texts

from

his more accessible Modes qf Tltolrght in&-

cate the deep congeniaIity between W hitehead and James and Dew ey o n the central

theme of reality as “fields”: “ T h e whole spatial universe s a field

of

force, or in other

words, a ficld of incessant activity” (p. 186). “ T h e n o t i o n

of

self-sufficient isolation is

no t exemplified in modern physics. T he re are n o essentially self-contained activities

with in limited region s. Th ese passive geometrical relationships between substrata

passively occupying regions have passed o u t of the pic ture . Nature s a theatre for the

inter-relations

of

activities” p.191).

19. C f. Elizabeth Flower and Murray

G.

Murphey,

A

History

ofPhilosoplty

in Amer -

ica,

2 vols. ( N e w York: Capricorn Books, 1977)’ II:666: “Alternately it [pure experi-

ence]canbe

read

asan ontological ormulation

of

what here

is,

or

as

a

phe-

nom enological field where ontological interpretation is suspen ded. Ag ain, i t could



242 Notes to C h q r e r

1

sim ply be used, in

a

tcchnical way, as thc experience-matrix o u t o f which objects of

know ledge are constructed.

I t

even has afinities with Dewey’s ‘experience’ and it

gaveJames as much trouble

as

it afterward made forDewey.” As Perry shows, James

had no illusions that he had realized

a

definitive and finished theory. WhatJames aid

concerning the mind-bo dy quest ion is applicable t o his m o re general theory: “The

only surely false the ory would bc a perfectly clear and final o n e ”

(TC, I:386).

While

James did not deny the importance and ut i l i ty of c lari ty and consistency,n the final

analysis, as Perry n otes, “hc was m uc h m or eafraid

of

thinness than hewas

of

incon-

sistency”

TC,

I:668).

20. Cf. TC, II:367: “ In the ma in

. . .

he was preoccupied with the ‘pure experi-

ence hypothesis’-in a detcrm ined effort t o resolve certain e h f n f i v e differences

of

t radi t ional thought into relational

o r

jlnctionnl differences.” See

also

Stevens, J H , 15:

“Thus, the t radi t ional problemof an unbridgeable chasm between adically different

entities, thoughts and things, is seen as

a

false question, w hen entitativ e differences

are replaced by relationa l o r jurrctional differences within a c o m m o n sp h e r e of pure

experiences.”

21.

Cf. Charlene Haddock Seigfried, Cltaos

nr ld

Context (Athens: O hi o Univers ity

Press, 1978), 43-44 (hereafter,

CC).

Seigfried convincingly shows the inadequacy

of

this passage: “A11 the criteria for physical things beg the question,” since

as criteriafor the ph ysical he gives physical descriptions w hichwould themselves

have to have other criteria

for

being physical.

For

instance, he says that the physical

can be distinguished from the

nlental if

it is recognized

as

entering into “relations

of

physical influence.” But it

is

precisely the problem f

providing a

ruIe to identify

the physical that is at

issue.

T he recognition of a relation

as

physical

does

not

tell

us

why it is physical and not mental. Furthermore, the criteria for thc mental

world

are no t exclusive and would apply equally

well

to the physicalworld.

The

physical

world is as transitory as themental field, chan ging all the while we ourselves

change. and the appeal to its “ph ysical inertness” again

begs

the question.

Of course , the di&culty

of

finding definitive, clear-cut characteristics to distinguish

the physical

from

the psychical is what

leads

both m aterialists and idealists to deny

that there are any. For an example from the side of idealism, see Josiah Royce, The

Spirit o fMo d e r n Philosophy (Bo ston and Ne w York: Hou gh ton , Miffl in , 1892), 350ff.

22.

Bruce Wilshire correctly, I believe,

notes

tha tJam es places an excessive bu rde n

o n

a “pure experience” when he “conceives f

a

single pure experience s being both

the knower and th e kn ow n. T hi s is exceedingly spare substantively, and it puts a

great theoretical load

on

pu re experience; a single pure experiencemust

be

perceiver,

perception,andperceived”

(Will iam Jnrnes

arld Pher lornemlogy

[New

York: AMS

Press, 19791, 170; hereafter WJP).

23. A .

J.

Ayer,

TheOrigirts of

Prugtnatisnt

(San

Francisco:

Freeman,

Coope r ,

1968),

292.

24. This sentence concludes: “ the philosophy of

pure

experience being on ly a

morecomminu ted Zderrtitutsykilosophie.” Wilshire,concerned to expose hephe-

nom enological tendencies of James’s th ou gh t, relates this text to James’s effort

to

overcome dualism

by

coming

“to

the poin t

of

saying that thought and thought’s

object are in

some

fundam enta1 way identical” (tt’JP, 14- 15).Cf. E R E , 263: “Can we

say, then, that the psychical and the ph ysical are absolutely heterogeneous? O n the

contrary, they are so i t t le heterogeneous that i f we adop t the commonsense

point of

view, if we disregard all explanatory nventions-m olecules and ether waves, for



Notes to Chapter

1

243

example, which at b o tt o m are metaphys ical entities-if, n short, we take reality

naively, as it is given, an imm ediate, then this sensible reality o n w h ic h ou r vital

interests rest and from w hich

all

o u r actions proceed, this sensible reality and the

sensation which we

have

of

it

are

absolutely identical one with the other

a t

the t ime

the sensation occurs. R eality is apperccption itself.”

25.

John Wild, The

R a d i d

Empiricism

OJ

Williarn James ( N e w York: Doubleday

Anchor Books, 1970), 361 (hereafter

REW’

W ilshire expresses

a

similar view in

describing why he finds a certain richness in PI,which is lacking in ERE. In the

fo rmer work , James “does not confront us nb

ovu

wi th a set of discrete pure experi-

ences, but rather with a whole lived-world of experience which is experienced by a

person

RS

lived by himself. H e takes the first steps toward

a

direct l inking

of

modes

of experiencing and m odes of the experienced, and so conceives experience that it

never takes

place

outs ide a contest. Indeed, the founding level of meaning is a con-

text’,

(WJP,

171). I t is ju st this fund amental contextual ch aractero f experience that is

acknowledged and safeguarded by the use o f “field” or “fields”

as

the

primary

meta-

physical metaphor.

26. Flower and M urphey, History

ofPhilosophy, lI:666.

27. Actually, the am biguity to w hich Stev ens efers

is

already present in PP; a few

lines before James d escribes the personal character of t hough t o r consciousness, he

says: “T l t e j r s t f a c t @ r HS, t h m ,

as

psychologists, is that thirzkiq ofsorne sort goes OH. . . .

If

we

could

say in English ‘it thinks,’

as

we

say ‘it rains’

or

‘it blows,’ we sho uld be

stat ing the fac t mo st s imply and w i th the m inimum of assumpt ion . As we canno t ,

we must simply say that rhoughrgues ou” (PP, 139-20).

28.

Wild

contends

that James’s desire to make room i n experience

for

both the

subjective and he objective gives

rise

to tw o qu i te d i ffe rent n terpre ta t ions . T h e

first, and acceptable, one holds that “experience may have an ov erarching structure

that is neither purely subject ive nor purely object ive but with a place

for

bo th of

these phenom ena .” O n the o ther hand, s ince ure experience “has room for both the

subjec tive and the objec tive, it is easy t o infer that in itself, as pure experience, it

must be nei ther the one nor the other, and

n

i tself neutral.” Th is in tu rn leads

to

the

view that “pure experience itself

s

composed of units which arc themseives neither

one nor the other, but neutra l to the whole dist inct ion.” Wild co m m ent s that “ the

dualism o f m ind and body needs

to be

overcome but this is coo

high

a price to pay”

29.

Cf. Wilshire,

WJP, 200:

“ I t is in this sense of an overabounding world, too rich

and fluid to be contained by any set of concepts-as truthfu l as that set m ig h t be-

which sets James off from

Husserl

and which places him nearer t o Heidegger and

Merleau-Ponty.”

30.

See also Stevens, J H , 177: “T he givenness of the perceptual field is absolute in

two senses: t is the absolute source

from

which consciousness derives the entire

fabric of reality and the absolute standardof t ru th for all mean ing.”

31. Both Stevens and Seigfried stress the fact that,for James, we never encounter

chaotic fluxof pure heterogeneity.

See

Stevens, j H , 20: “James insistson th e fact that

the origina l flow of experience is no t a manifold of totally heterogeneous im pres-

sions without s t ruc ture or continuity. But i t is, nonetheless, relatively unstructured

by com parison with the ul terior pat terns of organization imposed by intellectual

activity. T hu s th e ret ur n to pu re experience refers simply

to

the uncovering

of

a

world

of primary perceptions, considered in abstrac tion from theselective organiza-

(REW’, 355-54).



244

Notes t o C h p t e r

2

t ion of conception.”

See

also Seigfried, CC, 53: “Relations in pure experience are

quasi-chaotic in that they have no t ye t been hardened into specific identifiable rela-

tions which are attributable to a chosen context .”

32.

Cf . James ,

TC,

I:381:

“All that is is experiences, possible o r actual. Im me diate

experience carries a seme ofntore. .

. .

the ‘more’ develops, harmon iously or inhar-

mo nious ly; and term inates in fu’ulfillmento r check. .

.

. T h e p r o b l e m is to describc

the universe

in

these terms.”

33.

The following James text could, I believe, be accom mod ated within this k ind

of

field perspective: “The paper seen and the seeing of i t are only two nam es for one

indivisible fact which, properly named, s

the d z r r r m

tllephenometzott, OY the exyerielice.

The paper is in

the

mind and the m i n d is around the pape r, because paper and mind

are only two names that are givenater to the on e xperience, when, taken ina larger

world of which i t

forms

a part, its conn ections are traced in different directions. To

know

immediatdy,

rken, or intuirively,

isfor

tnet1tol rotllejtr n t ld o6ject

ro be idettrical”

( M T ,

36).

34.

Perry includes a selection from these notes as an appe ndix unde r the heading

“T he M iller-Bode Objections” (TC, II:750-65).

35. Cf.

the frequently cited text ofJarnes: “Life is in the transitions as m uc h as in

the terms connected; often, indeed,

it

seems to

be

there

more

emphatically” ( E R E ,

36.

‘ B r u ce

Kuklick,

The

Rise

of

Anrericntr Philosophy

(New Haven, Conn. : Yale

University

Press,

1977)’ 333 (hereafter R A P ) . Kuklick cites James’s reference

to

“a

pluralistic panpsychic view of the universe”

( P U ,

141). WhileJames

does

say that this

view is the “great empirical movem ent . . i n to

which our

generationhasbeen

drawn” ( P U , 141-42), he does not unequivocal ly make i t his own, herer elsewhere

in h is wri t ings . Thus the com menta tors

are

divided on w heth er Jam es wa s a pan-

psychist, w ith the ma jority in clining tow ard the n egativ e. or a subtle and insightful

argum ent that

James’s

later metaphy sics was a m o d e of process panpsychism , see

Marcus Peter Ford, kVilliatn ]rimes's Philosophy (Am herst: University of Massachu-

settsPress, 1982)’

esp.

75-89,

thechapterenti t led“PureExperienceand Pan-

psychism.”

42).

CHAPTER

2

1. Ralph H arper,

T h e

Existerrtial Experietlce (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins Uni-

versity

Press, 1972),

87.

2.

Cf. J o h n

Wild, The

Rndiml

Empiricism oj”fil l iarnJnmes (Ne w York: Doubleday

Anchor Books , 1970), 27: “T hu s before 1890and probably before 1885,James clear-

ly

recognized hat hum an consciousness is no t enclosed within

a

subjective con-

tainer, but is ra ther stre tched out towards objects of various

kinds

in the

manner

called intentioml by la ter phenomenologists .” Cf. a lso, Bruce Wilshire ,WilliarnJotnes

and Phmomenology ( N e w

York:

AMS Press, 1979),

125:

“The self is no t

a

sealed

container full of intrinsically private thoughts. I t is as if the sclf were blasted open

and distribu ted across the face of

the

l ivcd-world.”

3. john He rm an Randa ll , Jr., Nature

and

Historical

Expeuietzce

(New York: Co lum -

bia University Press, 1958), 173 (hereafter NNE). In a sense the characteristic of not

being enclosed within the envelope

of

the skin is not peculiar

to

h u m a n

selves

as the

following text from Dewey indicates: “T he th in g essential to bear in mind is that



l iv ing as an e m p i r i d a ffa ir is no t som cth ingwhich goes

on

below thc skin-surfaceof

an organism: it is always an inclusiveaffair invo lving conn ection, interactio n f wha t

is within the organic body and what lics outside in space and time, an d w ith higher

organisms far outside”

(Experience

m i

ature

[ N e w

York:

Dover,

19581,

282

(hcre-

after E N ) . See also John Dewey,

Art

as

Experiencf

(New York: Capr ico rn

Books,

1958),

58-59: “The

epidermis is only in the most superficial way an indication of

where an organism ends and i ts environnlent begins. . . the need that is man ifest in

the urgent impulsions that demand conlpletion through what the mvironm ent-

and it alone-can supply, is a dy nam ic ack no wl edg m en t

of

this dependence o f the

self for who leness upon i ts surroundings.” Cf. A .

E .

Bentley,

“The

Hum an Sk in :

Philosophy’s Last

Line

of Defense,” Pldosophy of‘ Scierlre 8 (1941): 1-19.

See

also

Whitehead’s

Adverztures

of ldeas ( N e w

York:

Free Press/Macmilian, 1967), 325, and

his

Modes

o j

Thought

(N ew York : Capr ico rn Books,

1958),

222.

For

a

somewha t

similar view f r o m within a different perspective, see Ralph Wendell Bu rho e, “Re-

ligion’s Role in Hum a n Evolut ion: The

Missing

Link B etw een Apc-Man’s SeIfish

Genes

and Civilized Altruism,” in Zygotr 14, no. 2: “Biological patterns and behav-

iors are not l imited to determination by g enes a lone. . .

.

organic s t ruc ture and

be-

havior are productsof the in te rac t ion of the gene t ic informat ion wi thparticular

set

of environing circumstances, .including culture and other non-random and enduring

factors, which properly haw been caned ‘paragenetic’ information by sucha veteran

biological

and

evolutionary theorist as

C.

H. Waddington.”

4.Terence Penelhu m in his essay on “Personal Identity” (TheEnq.dopedio qf Phi-

loroplry,

8 vols., ed. Paul Ed wa rds

(New

York:

Free

Press/Macmillan,

19671, VI:96.)

states: “T h e use

of

the wo rd ‘self,’ howev er, has

the

effect

of

confining thc question

t o

the

unity of the

mind

and

of

preventing the answer rom relying

o n

the temporal

persistence

of

the body.” Quite obviously, I intend n o such rcstrictive use

of

the

term. On the contrary, i t is the neutra l i ty of the term “self’ in relation to mind ard

body tha t comm ends i t .

5. O n e might note increasing evidence that some religious thinkers reject tradi-

t ional dual ism. SeeJohn

Shea,

W h r

Modern

Cutholic

BeIieves

nbo r r t

Heaven

m d

Hell

( Ch i c a g o : T h o m a s M o r e Press, 1972), 47:

“This

dualistic vicw

of

man, so long the

ally ofChrist ian a i th ,doesnot correspond withei thermodernor biblicalan-

thropology. Modern science envisions man as a psychosomatic unity.

.

.

.

T h e bibli-

cal view of ma n closely parallels th e m od er n. For both

O l d

and New Testament man

is a n indivisible whole. In biblical l i terature there are abund ant refcrcnces to

body,

soul, spirit , and heart but these are not parts into which man may be divided. E ach

of

these words refers fundam ental ly to thc who le man, a l though each does so in a

special m anne r.” E.

J.

Fortman n, after acknow ledging thc nondualistic views of Karl

Rahner and

John

Shea, proceeds

to

argue in favor

of a

m o d e

of

dua l i sm, d rawing

uponscience,psychology, and parap sych ology as well as scripture and the mag-

isterium. See his

Eueflastirrg

Life

ufiu

Denrh (N ew York: Abba

House,

1976),41-68,

ch. 2, “Is Man Natura l Iy Imm orta I?”

6. James, w h o struggled long and hard to f ind viable a lternative to dual ism , was

not unaware of the possibility that it was

a

fruitless endeavor. In one of his notes he

was led

to

ask: “Doesn’t i t seem like thc wrigglings of a worm on the hook, his

attempt to escape thc dualism of co m m o n sense?’’ (cited in Ralph Barton Perry,

T h e

Thought arld

Clzarncter of

Will inrnJmws, 2

vols.

[Boston: Little,

Brown,

19351, II:369;

hereafter TC).



246 Notes to C h p t e r 2

7.

While

some

f o r m of materialism is the dom inant intcllcctual perspective in a

variety

of

disciplincs, including thc social sciences, Harold j M oro w itz has called

at tent ion to an interest ing anomaly: “Whatas happened is that biologists, w h o once

postulated

a

privileged

role

for the hum an mind in nature’s hierarchy, havebeen

moving relentlessly toward the hard-core materialism that characterized nineteenth-

century physics. At the samc time, physicists, faced with compelling experimental

evidence, have been moving way from strictly mechanical modelsof the n iverse to

a view that sees the mind as playing an integral role in all physical events” (“Re-

discovering the Mind,” in The M i n d ’ s I , ed . Doug la s

R .

Hofstadter and Daniel C.

Dennet t [New York: B asic Books, 19811, 34; reprintcd

from

Psyd~olog,gy oday, Aug.

1980).

8. It is the James

of

the PrirzcipIrs ofPsycllology, prim arily thou gh not exclusively,

w h o

is

often described

as

a

ma terialist. Ch arles Sand ers Pcirce’s review

of

this work

calls James “m ater ialis tic to the core-that is to say, in a method ical sense, but not

religiously, since he does not

deny

a separable soul n o r a fu tu rc life” (cited in

TC,

11:lOs). Se e also , Ge org e Santayana’s review in

Atltrrttic Morztlzly

67 (1891):

555:

“Pro-

fessor James.

.

.

.

has here outdone the m aterialists themselves. H e has applied the

principle

of

the tota l and immediate dependenceof m ind on m atter to several fields

in which we are

al l

accustomed only to metaphysical or psychological hypotheses”

(cited by Gerald E. M yers , In t roduc t ion ,

PP,

1:xxxvii-xxxviii).

9.

A s

an example

of

how fluid and controversial the claims

of

materialism can

be,

the essays n

The

Mind’s I and the comments of i ts editors are most instructive.

Ho fstadter and De nnett them selves abel their perspective as materialism bu t, signif-

icantly, describe m ind s as kin ds of patterns or “sophisticated representational sys-

tems.”

They go

on to say: “Minds exist in brains and may com c to cxist

i n

pro-

grammed machines . I fand when such machines

ome

ab ou t, their causal powe rs will

derive not from he substances hey are made of, but from heir design and the

program s that run in t h e m ” p*

382).

in his cssay “M inds, Brains, and Program s,”

reprinted in the same volume,ohn R. Searle calls

such

a doct r ine “s t rong AI” [artif-

icial intelligence]-that is, “th e co m pu ter is no t m erel y

a

tool in the study

of

the

mind; ra ther the appropria te ly program med com puter really

is

a mind” (p . 353)-

and maintains that i t is a “residual form

of

dualism”

(p.

371):

Unless youaccept some form

of

dualism, hestrong A I project hasn’t got a

chance.

The

project

is

to reproduce and explain the mental

by

designing programs,

but unless the mind

is

not only conceptuatiy but emp irically independent of the

brain you couldn’t carry out the project, for the program is completely

indepen-

dent of any realization.

. .

. If mental operations consist in comp utational opera-

tions on formal symbols, then i t follows that they have no interesting connection

with the brain; the

only

connection would be that the brain

ust

happens to

be

o n e

of the indefinitely many types

of

machines capable of instantiating the program .

This form of dualism is not the traditional Cartesian variety that claims that there

are two sorts of subsrnrrces, but it

is

Cartesian in the

sense

that

what

is specifically

mental about the mind as

no

ntrinsic connection

with

the actual prope rties of the

brain.”

(pp. 371-72)

10. Stanislaw Lem, “The Seventh SaIly,” in The Cyberiad, trans. MichaeI

Kandel,

in T h e Mind’s

I ,

291.

11.

Two

t hinke rs wh o m igh t

be

mentioned are Michael Polanyi

and

Ervin Lazlo.

For

an

expression

of

the fundamental

shortcomings

o f

a n y

reductionism,

see

Thom-

as

Nagel’sessay “What Is I t

Like to

Be a Bat?” In The Mi r i d ’ s I , 392-93: “Any



reductionist program has to be bascd

on

at1 analysis of w hat is to be rcduced. If the

analysis leaves so m eth in g ou t, the

problem

will be falscly posed.

I t

is useless t o base

the dcfense of m aterialism on any analysis of mental phenom ena that fails to

deal

explicitly with their subjective character.”

12. Cf.

also

Randall,

N H E , 224:

“But the activities of th e so-called ‘subject’ are

clearly as ‘real,’ as ‘objective,’ as any othct processes invo lved in the total coopcra-

t ion. They have ju st

as

valid a claim to a legitimate ontological

status

in Substance.”

Remember we previously noted that for Randall, that “Substance”

can

also be called

“the Field.”

13. Cf. Gabriel Marcel, A4etuyltysictrl~o~rrnn/.rans. Bcrnard Wall (Chicago:

H cn r y

Regnery, 1952), 241: “C an w e bclicve that death is th e real cessation o f personal life

without implicitly recognizing the truth of materialism?”

14.

John Dewey, “Experience, Know ledge and Value,” in

The

Philosoplty qjJolr tr

Dewey,

ed. Paul Arth ur Schilpp (New York: Tudor, 1951), 604 (hereafter M I / ) .

15. It would be more accurate,perhaps, to say hat his ext“clearlyexpresses

Dewey’s desire to reject reductionism,” for other tcxts raise some d u u b t

as

to whe the r

he succeeded. See, c . g . , E N , 253-54: “T h e differrncc betwcen he animate plants

and thc inanimate iron rnoleculc is no t that the former has someth ing in addit ion to

physico-chem ical energy; i t lies in th e

way

in which the physico-chemical energies

arc interconnccted and operate, whence different c o tm q 1 m c c s mark inanimate and

animate activity respectively.” Dewey’s awareness of a

kind

of inconclusiveness and

ambiguity accompanying this quest ion

s

indicated, I believe, in EN,

262:

“While the

theory that l ife, feeling and thoug ht are neve r indep ende ntof physical events may be

deemed matcrialism, it may

also

be considered just the opposi te .

For

it is reasonable

to believe that the most adequate definition

of

th e basic traits of natural existence

can

be

had only when i ts propert ies are most fully displayed-a condition which is m et

in the degree of the

cope

and int imacy

of

interactions realized.”

See

also EN,

255.

I t is clear that Dewey, along with many other twentie th-century thinkcrs, wishes

to present a doct r ine of mind and matter that avoids both ontological dualism and

reductionism. it

can

sa f d y

be

said,

I

believe, that to

this

day there remains

a

formida-

ble

gap between the wish and the realization. I n

a

no te appended to “Wha t

s

I t Like

to Be a Bat?”

(TheMind’s I , 403n.),

Nagel touches upon one reason for this

gap:

I have not dcfined

the

term “physical.” Obviously, it does not apply

just

to what

can

be

described by the concepts

of

contemporary physics, sincewe expect further

developments.

Some

may think here

is

nothing to prevent mental phenomena

from eventually being recognized

s

physical in their own righ t. B ut whatever else

may be said

of

the physical,

i t has

to

be

objective.

S o

if

our

idea of the physical ever

expands

to include mental phenomena, i t will

have to

assign them a n objective

character-whether o r not this

is

done by analyzing them in terms of other phc-

nornena alrcady regarded

as

physical. it seems

to

me more

likely,

howev er, that

mental-physical relations will eventually be expressed i n a theory whose funda-

mental terms cannot be placed

in

either category.

See also p. 392: “Without consciousness the mind-body problem would be m u c h

less interesting. With consciousness it eems hopeless . Th e m ost imp or tan t andhar-

actcristic feature of conscious mental phenomena is very poorly understood. Most

reductionist heories

d o

no t even tr y to explain t .Andcarefulexaminationwill

show that

no

currently available concept of reduction is applicable to it. Perhaps a

new theoretical form can be devised for the purpose,

but such

a solution, if i t exists,

lies in the distant intellectual future.”



I believe hat i t can

be

said of bo th James’s doctrinc of “pure experience” and

Dewey’s metaphysics

of

“natural cvcnts” that they were attempting to construct “a

theory whose fun damen tal terms cann ot be placed in either category.”

16.

E.W

is

“metaphysical”

in

thc descriptive rather than specu lativc

sense

of

the

term;

t h a t

is, Dewey’s aim was to describe the “univcrsal generic traits of cxistcnce”

rather than arrive at the "ultimate" principles of reality. This distinc tion shou ld be

kept in mind in what

follows.

17. Cf. Dewey, EN, xi i : “The

irrfrirzsil

naturc of events is revealed in experience as

thc immediately felt qualities

of

things.”

All

events have “qualities” that charactcrize

them, and it is the quality of an event that is im mediately experienccd.

For

a clear,

concisc exposition of “qualities” a5 u n d e r s t o o d b y I k w e y ,

sce

Richard Bernstein,

Jokn

D e w e y New

York: W ashington Square

Press,

1969),

89-101,

ch. 7, “Qualita-

tive Immediacy.” What

we

“know,“ accord ing toDewey, are “objects” not “events.“

Cf. E N ,

328: “W hen it is d enied that we are conscious of

w m t s

as such it does not

mean that we are not awareof aejccts. Objects are

preciseiy

what

we

arc awarc

of.

For

objcctsareevcnts w i t h meanings; ables, hemilky way,chairs,stars,cats, dogs,

electrons, ghosts, centaurs, historic epochs and all t hc n~u l t i f a r iousubject-matter of

discourse designable by com m on n ou ns , verbs and their

qualificrs.”

18. T h e event character

of

reality

a s

Dewey understands it presents a formidable

obstacle

to

belief in the kind of enduring selfI

will

pose. O n e text expresses Dewey’s

view

in

a

ra ther touching manner:

A thing may endure secrrla

S C C I I / U Y I I I I I

and yet not bc everlasting; it will crumble

before the gnawing tooth of

time,

as it exceeds a certain measure. Every existence

is an evcnt.

The fact is nothing a t which to repine and nothing to

gloat over.

I t is something

to be noted and used. I f it is discom forting when applied to good things. to o u r

friends, possessions and precious selves, ~t is consoling also to k n o w that n o evil

endu rcs foreve r; thdt thc longcst fane turns som etime , and that the nmnory

and

loss ofne arcst and dearest grows dim in time. ( E N , 71)

19. T h e slow rate of change, mp erceptible o he ancients, was probab ly one

reason why

they

were

led

to posit

a n

unchatlging reality.

20. Cf. James, E R E , 39: “On the principles w h i c h I a m defending a ‘mind’ or

‘personal consciousness’ is the

n a m e

for a series of experienccs run together

by

cer-

tain definite transitions, and an objective reality is a series

of

simiIar experiences knit

together by different transitions.”

21. See also E N , xiii: “M ind is seen to be a function of social interaction s, and to

be a genuine characterof natural events w he n these attain the stageof the widcst and

most complex interact ion with one another.” Sec also

E N ,

267-68, where Dewey,

speaking of the correspondence of the “physical” and “psyc hical,” contends that

“the one- to-on e agree me nt is intelligible oniy as a correspondence of properties and

relations in one and the sam e world whic h is first taken up on a narrower and more

external level of interaction, and then upon a m or e inclusive and intimate level.” See

also E N , 285: “in he hyphena ted phrase body-m ind, ‘body’ designates he con-

tinued and conserved, the registered and cumulative operation of factors continuous

with

the

rest of nature, inanimate as well as animate; while ‘mind’ designates

the

charactersandconsequenceswhicharedifferential, ndicative of featureswhich

emergew h e n ‘body’ is

engaged

in a widermore complex and nterdependent

situation.”



22. See

also

E N , 284: “To

explain

is

t o

employ

on e thi ng to elucidate, clear,

shed

l ight upon, put in a better order, because in a wider context, another thing. I t

is

thus

subordinate to mo re adeq uate discou rse, wh ich, applie d o spac e-time affairs, as-

sumes

thc

style

of

narration and description. Speaking

in

terms

of captions famiIiar

in rhetoric , exposi t ior~ and argum ent are a lways subordinatc to a descriptive narra-

tion, and exist

for

the sakc of n u k i n g

the

latter clcarer. mo rc cohe rent and mo re

significant.”

23. This

“integration

of

organic-environmen tal connections” is,

of

course, pre-

eminently present in that organic activity designatcd mind. Cf. Randa l l ,

N H E ,

220-

23, for an explicit expression of this Deweyan point:

Mind

as

we

encounter i t

in

“the mental situation” s rather

a

complex set

of

powers

of cooperating in t ha t mental functioning. . . . Strictly speaking, M ind

in

this per-

sonal

sense

is

a

power,

not

of

operating, but of cooperating wi th other

powcrs.

Mind

is

thus, l ikc

all

powers,

a

relational po wer.

.

. . Hence, if we take Mind a s a

power

to

act in certain

ways,

we must not forget that his power belongs to what is

encountered as well as to the encounterer, the so-called h u m a n “agent” in think-

ing.

. .

. Mind as

a power

belongs to the process of encountering.

. . .

conse-

quently, the question, “What

is

it that think s?” beco me s the question, “What are

the

different powers

that coop erate in

the

process of thinking?”

24.

Cf.

PP)

1:277:

“ T h e m i n d is a t everystage a theatre of simultaneous pos-

sibilit ies. Co nscio usne ss cons ists in the com pariso n of these with each o ther, the

selection

of

some,

and the

suppression

of

the rest by the reinforcing and inhibiting

agcncy of attention.”

25. Dewey’s debt toJam es concer ning such no tions as “ the vague,” “focus,” and

“fringe” is obviou s.

26. John Dewey, HwnatJ

Nutuw

arrd C o m h t (New York: Modern Library,

1930),

61

-62.

CHAPTER

3

1. This , at least is the basically persuasive picture presented byMilic Capek’s “The

Reappearance of the Self i n the Last PhiIosophy

of

W illiam James,”

Philosophical

Review 62 (1953): 526-44. Capek is here rejecting

Dewey’s

claim hat James was

m oving in the direction

of

a behavioraI account of the “self.” Cf. “The Vanish ing

Subject in the Psychology of

James,”

Jorrrnal o j

Philsopplty, Psychology and

SEient$c

Merhod

37

(1940):

589-99,

reprinted in John Dewey, P r o b l e m ofMer1 (New York:

Philosophical Library,

1946)’

396-4139 (hereafter PM).

2. Cf. James

M.

Edie, “The Philosophical Anthropologyof W illiam Jam es,” in

An

h i t d o n o Phenomerrolugy, ed. James

M.

Edie (Chicago: Quadrangle

Books, 1965),

128:

“James is clearest ab ou t what he rejects: the theory of the substant ia l soul , the

associationistic theory o f Hume, the Transcendental Ego

of

Kant-all of which are

rejected o n ‘pheno meno logical’ grounds, e . , as unsatisfactory accounts of o u r expe-

rience of self-identity. B ut on th e relationship of the bodily processes

to

the ‘self

wh ich is ‘never an object to i tse lf James gives, in The Principles,

no

clear answer and

seems to hesitate between parallelism, epiphenom enalism,

and

interactionism, de-

pending on his polemical concerns of t h e m o m e n t . He

was

content to leave the

problem

open and unsolved.”



250 Notes t o

Chapter 3

3 . T h e polemical th rust ofmuch ofJarncs’s w ritin g

on the

self mu st always be kept

in mind. In a particular instance he

is

first

of

all concerned to expose he inadequacies

ofone or another “es tab l i shed” posi t ion . s Gerald E. Myers says: ‘yarnes alternated

between placing the burden

of

d o u b t , n o w u p o n t h ematerialist, then upon the spir-

itualist. In his discussion of emotion and the consciousness of self

h e

placed that

burden upon the latter. In his theoriz ing about a t tent ion andwill,

on

the o ther hand,

it is placed upon the m aterialist” (PPJ1:xxxiv).

4. Cf. Edie, Invitation,

128:

“But here again, he does not overcom e the original

am biguity ; he can be read as an ‘egologist’

or

as a ‘non-ego logist’ ( though I believe

the egological interpretation is

more

consonant wi th the tenor ofis philosophy as a

whole particularly since he continues to speak of he experietrcirrg ego

as

a

unified

‘self

u p

to

the end

of

his life).”

5.

Ralph Barton Perry,

The Thorlght

n t ~ d

harclcter

qf WilliatnJurnes,

2

vols.

(Boston:

Little, Brown, 1935),

II:668

(hereafter

TC).

6.

T h e r e is a

sense

in

which

“feeling” is wider than “perceptual experience” and

can be applied

also

to “conceptual expericnce.” I t canbesaid

tha t

for

James,

all

concepts are “feelings” but not all “feelings” arc concepts. James was concerned to

avoid assigning “feelings” and “concepts” to diftkrent orders of being. Something of

this is reflected in an early article (“Some Omiss ions of introspective Psychology,”

Mind, Jan.

1884)

a large excerpt from

which

is reproduced by James in a long foot-

note in

PP,

I:451-52.

A

few

lincs

wiIl indicate the direction

of

his thought .

The contrast is really between tw o a s p c m , in which

all

mental facts witho ut excep-

tion may be taken; their structural aspect, as being subjective, and their functional

aspect, as being cognitions. . .

.

F r o m the cognitive point of view, all mental facts

are intellections.

From

the subjective point of view a11

are

feelings. .

.

.

The current opposition of Feeling to knowlcdge is quite a false issue. If

every

feeling is

a t

the same time bit of know ledge, we ou ght no longer to talk of mental

states differing

by

having more o r less, in having much fact o r little fact for their

object. The feeling of a broad scheme

of

relations is

a

feeling that knows much: thc

feeling

of a simple

quality

is

a

‘feeling that

knows

little.

7.

Ra lph Ba rton Ycrry, III T h e

Spirit

of

William

Junes

(Ne w Ha ven, Co nn. : Yale

University

Press, 1938), 82-83

(hereafter, SW’.

8.

See

also

PP,

:165: “Fix the essence of feeling is

to

be felt, and

as a

psychic

existentfeelr, so

i t must

be.”

I d o n o twish to suggest that this c la im s unp roblem cd.

As w e shall see when we discuss the self-cornpoundingof consciousness, some hold

that James finally surrendered it. While he modified particular interpretation of it, I

do not think he ever denied

the

irreducible character of experience that it expresses;

in

fact, h e repeated i t in

a

work

he

was wri t ing a t

the

t ime

of his

death (Cf. SPP, 8).

9.

See also PP,

1:591:

“ A

succession

o

/eelirgs,

it1 arld o itselJ

is

not

n

feelirrg

of

successiotl.

”

10. Bruce Wilshire co m m en ts on this tcxt: ‘lJarnes is thus sha rply critical of what

we

know

today as behaviorism which misses thesebasic tendencies and is, therefore,

a psychology which dispenses with the psyche; i t

s

a self-satirizing science” (Wi/ l im

Jarnes and Phertonrerrology [New York:

AMS

Press, 19791, 99; hereafter NYP). Wilshire

goes on t o

argue

that James’s

“remaining

dualist ic structure” landshim in d i6cu l t ies

from

the perspective of phenomeno logy (WJP, 100). These “d ifficulties” are not of

concern here. since what

is

being stressed is the irreducible and distinctive character

of “feelings of tendency.” Con cerning the distinctive characterf these feelings , Vic-



Nofes

to Chapter 3

25 1

tor Lowe makes an eminently helpful comp arison:

‘I

Wt i f e h end ’ s “ J ~ ~ - S P ~ I S ~ I O U Sercep-

tiorl’

is

wh at James

.

.

. d l e d

‘the plairl corljlrrzcliue

experierm’; i t ha s no name in the

P5yctdogy, bu t is described undcr

a

number of headings suchas ‘feelings o f relation’

and‘feelings o f tendency’

”

(Urlderstartdirtg

Whitehead

[Ba l t imore : Johns Hopk ins

University Press,

19661,

343).

11. Robert R. Ehman, “Will iam James and the Structure f the Self’ inNew Essays

in

Phenornertology, ed. James

M.

Edie (Chicago: Quadrangle Books,

1969),258

(here-

after

N E P )

12. Recall the previously cited text from Dew ey i n which he describes “ a first-rate

test o f the value of any philos ophy wh ich is offered us: D oes i t end in conclusions

which, when they are referred back to ordin ary life-experiences and their predica-

ments, render them more significant,

more

l u m i n o u s t o us,

and

make

our

dealings

with them m ore frui tful?”

(Experience

and

Nnttrre

[Ne w York: Dover ,

19581,

7).

See

also Jam es, SPP, 33-34: “ T h e w o r l d of common-sense ‘things’; the world of mate-

ria1 tasks to be don e; thc m athem atical wo rld of pure forms; the wor ld

of

cthical

propositions; heworlds of logic,

of

m usic , etc.-all abstrac ted an d gene ralized

from long-forgotten perceptual instances, from wh ich they have as it were flowered

out-return and

merge themselves again in the particulars of ou r pre sen t a nd futu re

perception.”

13. Cf.

Wilshire,

WJP,

126:

“Th e

general point is that he

does

not consider the self

to be

a

stable, isolable,

and

self-identical particular in the sen se that

a

diamond is

such a particular.”

14. “ T h e S t r e a mof T h o u g h t , ” PP, 219-78. In PBC, his chapter is given the title

by

which i t is most widely known, “ T he Stream

of

Consciousness.”

15.

Cf.

Dewey,

P M , 397: “The

material of the important chapteron the ‘Streamo f

Consciousness’

.

. . verbally is probably the most subjectivist ic part of th e book.”

Dewey imm ediately adds:

“I

say ‘verbally’ because it is quite poss ible to translate

‘stream

of

consciousness’ into ‘cours e

of

experience’ and retain the substance of the

chapter.”

16.

Cf.

Wilshirc,

WJP, 125:

“T he upsh ot of C hap ter Ten is that the self is not

a

sealed contain er full o f intrinsica lly private tho ugh ts.

I t

is as if the self were blasted

open and distributed across the face

of

the lived-world.”

17.

Cf. E h m a n , N E P , 264: “ In maintaining that our present pulse of cons cious life

might be selfless,

James

opens h imse lf to the criticism that his interpretation

of

the

central self as fclt bod ily rn ovcm ents is ind eed reduc tive.”

18.James concedes at icast the possibility f

the

“feeling” that Ehman insists upon.

Cf. PP,

I:323: “The p rc scn t moment of consciousness is thus, as

Mr.

Hodgson

says,

the darkest in th e wh ole series. I t may feel its own existence-we have

all

a long

admitted the possibility

of

this,

hard

as it

is by

direct introspection to ascertain the

fact-but no th in g can

be

k n o w n

nbout

it

till

i t be dead and gone.”

19.

T h e previously cited text

from Jamcs, W h z e u P r my i n t~ospecr iveg lnr l cestrccecds

in

tunritlg rotrnd

quickly-dl

it cnw

e v e r j e l

distincrly

is sortre bodily process,”

is similar to

David Hurne’s w ell-known passage in his

Trentise o

Humat1 Na t u r e : “For my part,

when 1 enter most int imately ntowhat

I

call

myself ;

I a lwaysstumble on some

particular perception or other, of heat or cold, l ight or shade , love or hatred, pain or

pleasure. I never catch rnyselfatany t ime witho ut perception, a nd never can observe

anything but the perception” (David Hume, A Treatise ofHutmr l

Nuure,

2d ed., ed.

L. A . Selby-Bigge [Ox ford: Clare ndo n Press , 19781, bk. I , pt. 4, sec. 6, p.

252).

I



252

Notes t o Choprev 3

believe that Roderick Chisholm’s cri tique o f Hurne is equally applicable to James:

“If

H u m e finds what

hc

says

he

finds, that is to say, if he finds not only pcrccptions, but

also that

he

f inds them and hence that there

s sorneorw

w h o finds t hem , how can h is

premisses

be

used

to

establish the conclusion that he never observcs anything b ut

perceptions?” (“On theObscrvability

of

theSelf,”

in

Larrgrqe ,

A4elaphysicss,

atld

Death,

ed. John Donnel ly [ N e w York: ordham Universi ty Press,

19781,

139). See

also 144, 146: “‘Could i t be that a man might be aware of himself as experiencing

without thereby being aware of himself?’ I f what

I

have suggested is true, then the

answer should

be

negative. For in being

aware

of ourselves as experiencing, w c are,

ipso)cto, aware of the self

or

person-of the

self or

person being affected ina certain

way.

. .

. From the fact that

we

are acqua in ted with t he seIf

as

it manifests itself as

having certain qualities, i t

follows

tha t

we

are acqua in ted wi th the self as it is in

itself.”

I

have previously noted that field view

of

the self rejects a n y “self as it is in itself”

insofar as this suggests that theelf has

a n

essential reality independent o f its relations

and activities. Since there isn o

“self’

independent of the rda t ions r fields (including

its activity

fields)

that constitute i t , there

is

n o “self in itself’ t o be know n. Nev-

ertheless,despite erminolocjcaldifferences,

my

poin t is not verydifferent from

Chisholm’s, since

I am

affirming an awareness

of

the self in , through, and with those

activities and relations whereby

i t

is a self.

20.

1

Corin th ians

15:35-40.

21. C f. Maurice Canez, “With W hat Body Do the Dead

Rise

Again?’’ in

I r w m r -

tal iry

m d

RewrreCtiott, ed .Pie rreBeno i tandRolandM u r p h y(Herder

ei

Herder ,

1970), 93: “For Paul the body cannot be reduced simply

to

the materia l comp onent

of

the animated being which is man. . . . The word ‘body’ ra ther describes man in

a

definite situation, in relationto others, than reduced to himself a lone.

.

. . T h e b o d y

is man responsible for what he does, for how he lives; i t

is

his entire situation , his

totality, his p ersonality.” See also Joachim Gnilka; “C on tem po rary Exegetical Un-

derstanding of ‘The Resurrection of the Body,’ ” in ibid., 129- 141. For

a

brief de-

scription

of

a

n u m b e r o f iew s o n t h e“risen body,” see

Everlasting

Life

u j e r

Death,

E.

J. Fortrnann, S. j. (New York: Alba House , 1976),240-50.

To

say

that there is no simple and u nequivocal identity between the “resurrection

body” and the present body s not to den y ha t they must

i n

5ome way be the “same.”

Cf. Thomas A quinas , Summa

Theolugica,

I i I (suppl.) , Q. 79, Art .

1,

trans. Fathers

of

t he Eng l i sh Domin ican Prov ince (New York: BenzigerBrothers, 1948),

III:2890:

“We cannot call it resurrection unless the soul re turn to the sam e b ody, since resur-

rection is a second rising. . .

.

And conseq uently i f it be not the same

body

which

the soul resumes, i t will no t be a resurrection, but ra ther the assuming of a new

body.”

The

difference in language and nletaphysicai assumptions precludes any un-

qualified incorporation of Aquinas’s view within the pragmatic perspectivc of this

essay. Nev ertheles s, there is a crucial and significant insight here that must be ac-

counted

for,

as will

bc

evident when

I

later speculate on the kin d f transformation of

the

self

that is neces sary f hebelief n mm ortality o r resurrection is to have

plausibility.

22. Cf. Max Sche le r, “Lived Body, E nvironment , and Ego,” in T h e Philosophy o

the Body, ed.Stuart F. Spicket

( N ew

York: Quadrangle /TheN e w

York Times

Books,

1970),

159-86, a translation by Manfred S. Frings

of

an excerpt from Sche-

Ier’s D e r Formalismus i n der Etlzik und die materiais LVerte Ethik, first published in 1916.



253

A s

the translator notes, “Schcler makes a phenomenological distinction betwcen the

lived body

[Leib]

and thing-body [Korperj. This dist inct ion, important for thc ent irc

phcnornenologicalmov ement, can eraced ack to his essay, ‘Die Id o k der

Sebsterkcnntnis,’

191

1. ”

(Incidentally, he Spicker volume is an eminently useful

collection of essays and excer pts f rom a v ariety of thinkers, centering on the thcme

of the “b od y” in antidualistic l i terature.)

23. Jean-Paul Sartre, BeitIg u r d N o t l r i q p s s , trans. Hazel E. Barnes (New York:

Philosophical Library, 1956), 305 (hereafter BN).

24. Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Pltetrow~mologyoJPerreptiorr, t r ans. Co l in Smi th (New

York: Hum anities Press,

1962),

98, 100. See also p. 139: “We must therefo re avoid

saying that our bo dy is i r t space,

or

ir-1 t ime. I t irdzubits space and time .”

25. Gabriel Marcel, Mystery ofBt’ittg,

2

vols., trans.

G.

S. Fraser (Chicago: Henry

Regnery, 19SO), I:100 (hereafter M B ) .

26.

GabriclMarcel, Metayhysiral Jortrr~ol, trans.Bernard Wall (Ch icago :Henry

Regnery, 1952; hereafter, M J .

27.SeealsoWilshire, WJP, 137: 3am es’s alk of movem ents n hehead is an

attempt to describe his o w n b o d y as a phcn onlenal presentation; i t is no t an attem pt

to discover th e causal bases o f consciousness. . . I t is true that there is a pervasive

physiological aura about i t aII. But perhaps this is the

w a y

a physiologist and doctor

of medicine som etimcs experiences his ow n bod y.”

28.

Richard Stevens,

James

and

Hrrsser l :

The

Forrfrdutious

ofMeatlirlg

(The Hague:

M artinus Nijho K 1974), 72 (hereafterJH).

29. See

also

]H,

42-43: after critically analyzing those texts that describe “t he

interpretation of bodilyreaction as autom atism ,unrelated o heperformance of

consciousness,” Stevens calls atten tion to ot he r passages in which ‘yanles rejccts the

view

of the bod y as a psychophysical thing whose transformations arc automatically

provoked by stimuli resulting

from

physical impressions.”

30.

John

Wild,

The Radicnl

Empiricism

of William

]awes

( N e w

York:

Doubleday

Anchor Books, 1970), 87,

379-80.

31.

For

a

free but accurate expression

of

lames’s notion, see Charlene Hadd ock

Seigfried, Chaos and Corttext (Athens: Ohio University

Press, 1979),

94: “Some t imes

the body is looked upon as a physical object amon g others, since it can be cou nted,

its m etabolic functions tabulated, alld its reactions to certain stimuli ccurately co m -

puted. At other times the body is cons idered as peculiarly personal, as a center

of

decisionandaction and asanarena

for

spiritual, i e . , private, operations such as

memory , desire, dreaming, and thinking.”

32.

I do not w ish to suggest that W ilshire and are using the “fie ld” m etaphor o r

the same purpose or wi th the same mean ing . He is us ing i t to su pp ort his phe-

nomenological reading of the

Principles,

while I am employ ing i t

s

the metaphysical

metaphor that most adequately expresses the metaphysical assumptions ofjames as

well

as

some otherpragmatists .B ydis ting uis hin g “field-like” and“stream-like”

characteristics, W ilshire seems to m ean som eth ing ess intrinsically processive than I

do.While

I

would not insist hat all fieldsareproce ssive as wellasrelational-

mathem atical ieldsperhaps

are

exceptions--I a m ma intaining hat all

exister~tial

fields are processive-relational.

33. Merleau-Ponty, Plterzomeftology

of

Perception, 98.

34.

First pub lished in the

Psychology

Review

12,

no.

1

ran.

1905);

reprinted

with

“slight verbal revision” in E R E , 79-95.

All

References are

to

t he no te

on

p. 86.



254 Notes to Chapter 3

35. Stevensadds:“Husserl remarks that hebody, ‘reviewed

from

the nside,’

reveals itself as an organism which moves freely andby means of which the subject

experiences the external wo rld. From this point of iew,

it

would seem tha t the body

cannot

be

spatially located alongsidc

of

other objects. Rather, the body is experi-

enced as a zero-point, ‘.

. .

as a centre around which the rest of the spatial worid is

oriented.’ O n the other hand, ‘viewed from outside,’ the body appears as

a

thing

amo ng others and subject to ausal re la tionships with surrounding objects” ( I H ,

88).

36. T h e notion of the body as a “cente r” of relations is not confined to Husserl

and James. Cf., for example, Same,

BN,

320, who

speaks

of “ m y

b o d y

inasmuch

as

it

is the total center of reference which things indicate.” ee also Marcel, M

334-35,

who no te s tha t when he a l lows “my body” to becomen object,

“ I

cease to

look

o n

it as

my

body,

I

deprive i t of that absolute priori ty in vir tue of which

m y body is

posited as thecentre n e la t ion owhichm yexperienceandm yuniverseare

ordered. ”

37. Cf.

W illiam Ernest Hocking , who, though

more

sympathetic

to

philosophical

idealism than James, still m aintained that “w ith ou t bodiliness o f some sort there can

be no personal l iving. E xistence, for a person, implies awareness o f events in time-

a continuity of par t icu la rs , no t an absorp t ion in universa ls or The One”

T h e M e m -

i q

f h m o r t a l i f y

in

Hlrmarl

Experience

[ N e w

York:

Harper, 19571, 188).

38. Cf. Edie ,

Zrtvitntion,

122: “By the ‘world of sense’ James does

rtof

mean the

chaotic

mass

of

d u m b ‘st imuli’ o f physiological

or

‘sensationalistic’ psychology, but

the concretely experienced ‘life-world’ to which Merleau-Ponty,

or

his part,

accords

‘the primacy o f perception.’

”

39. This would have to be greatly q ualified as regards science in general but partic-

ularly as regards contemp orary physics: paradoxically, as its language has becom e

more “exact,” the reality of “m atter” has seemed to dissolve. T his has been app arent

for some t ime as the fol lowing text wri t ten over f if ty years ago indicates: “B ut the

physicists themselves have, if the phrase m a y be allowed , dissolved the m ateriality f

matter,

A

bo dy is in th e last resort, I suppose , now regarded as

a

complex sys tem o f

energy”

(W,

R. M a t th e w s , “ T h e D e s t i n y

of

the Soul ,”

Hibber t ]o t rmal28 ,

no .

2

uan.

19301:

200, ci ted by Corl iss Lamont in

The

Illusiotl ofIntrrrorfuality [ N e w York: Freder-

ick Ungar, 19651, 53 . ) M or e recently

R.

Mattuck in comment ingon n te rac t ing

particles said:

“So,

if we are after exact solutions, no bodies a t all is already too

m any ” (ci ted by DougIas R. Hofstader in T h e Mind’s

I ,

ed. Doug las R. Hofstader

and Daniel

C.

Dennet t [New York:Basic Bo ok s, 19811,

145).

40.Cf. Ignace Lepp, Death a d ts

Mysteries,

t r ans . Be rna rd Murch land (New ork:

Macmillan, 1968),

158: “ I

assert unequivocally that

a

ma n is truly his body. . . ~ But a

basic intuition, anterio r to all rational cons tructs, teaches us that we are some thing

other, and more than

ur

bodies.” There

s,

for

example,

a

belief present fr om earliest

times and within a variety o f culture s and still prevalent today to the effect that wh at

really const i tutes us cannot be touchedy punishment of our bod ies. Th at the efusal

to m a k e a simple identification between ou rselves and our bodies is not merely a

sentimental residue of mo re primit ive experiences evidenced in the following claim

by contemporary ana ly t ic phi losopher Sydney Shoemaker : “Recent work

o n

the

problem ofpersonal identi ty strongly indicates that the identi ty condit ions forersons

are different

from

those for bodies,n such away as to mak e i t possible

or

a person to

have different bodies at different times; that persons cannot, therefore be identical wit

their bodies; and that at any given time inperson’s

life

it is a contin gent fact that hehas



Notes to Chapter 4

255

the body

he

has instead of some other one” (“E mbo dimen t and Beh avior ,” in Tile

Identities

ofPersons,

ed. Amelie Oksenberg Rorty [Berkeley: Universi tyof California

Press,

19761,

13511.).

41. The Social

I sycholo<qy

of

George

Herbert Mead,

ed.

Anselm

St raws (C h icago ;

University of Chicago Press, 1956),213, 212. See also p. 217: “Persons who believe

in im m orta lity, or believe in

ghosts,

or

in the possibilityd t h c self leaving thc body,

assume a self which is quite dist inguishable from the body.

How

successfully they

can hold these conceptions is an open quest ion, but we do, as a fact, s epa rate the self

and the organism.’’

42. Hans Linschoten,

ON

he Way toumds a

Ptrertomenologid A y d r o l q y : Tltr Psy-

chology

of W i l l i n r n fumes, ed.ArnadeoGiorgi Pi t tsburgh:DuquesneUniversi ty

Press,

1968),

65.

43. We shall

see

that in James’s

later

writ ings he will speak of the self in te rms of

fields of

consciousness rather than the body. T h u s

the

“central self” which, as

we

have seen, is described in bodily terms in the Principles is described in term s of con-

sciousness in A Pluralistic Universe. Cf

PU,

31n.:

“ The

conscious self of the mo-

ment ,

the

central self,

is

probabIy determined to this privi leged

position

by its func-

tional connexion with the

body’s

imminen t o r present acts.”

C HA P T E R 4

I.. T he lack

of

a consensus concerning personal identity-whether it is, and if

s o

in

what it consists-has not chan ged mu ch since James’s t ime . “ T h e Identity

of

the

Self’ is the title of the opening chapter of Robert Nozick’s widely discussed Philo-

sophical Explanntions (Cambridge :HarvardUniversi tyPress,

1981;

hereafter PE).

Th is chapter focuses on the “metaphysical question” of “personal identi ty through

time,” that is, “how , given changes,

man

there be identity

of

some th ing from o n e

time to another, and in what does this identity consist?” N ozick no tes that“so m a n y

puzzling examples have been put forth in recent discussionso f personal identity that

it

is

di&cult

to

formulate,

much

less defend, any consistent view

of

identi ty and

n o t k d e n t i t y ” (p. 29). W hatever the diftlculties, personal identity has no t ceased t o be

a problem of concern to philosophers. Analytic philosophers in particular have con-

tributed

to

the store of technical arguments in supp ort of the various op tions-n o

identity, dentity hroughbodilycontinuity, dentity hroughpsychologicalcon-

tinuity, identity throug h some combinat ion of bodily and psychological continuity,

identity hrough some substantial o r transce nden tal principle-but theoptions

themselves have no t significantly increased or decreased though there are continuing

shif ts n he nu m ber of suppor te rs for a part icular opt ion. The l i tera ture on the

question o f personal identity is rapidly approaching

the

category of “vast ,” but

two

collections of essays can serve as usefu l in t roduc t ions to the“state of the question”:

Personal

Identity, ed.

John

Perry (Berkeley: University ofCalifornia Press,

1975); The

Iderrtitier

ofPersons,

ed . Arne l ie Oksenberg Ror ty (Berke ley: U niversi ty f Califorrlia

Press,

1976).

2. Cf. R a lph Bar ton Perry ,

Thc

Thought u r d Character o WilliumJames Boston:

Little, Brown,

1935),

II:72-73 (hereafter TC): “Thus dua l i sm’ was a provisional

doctrine by which

James

the psychologist

hoped

to e l iminate

and

pos tpone

a ques-

tion

on

whichJames the philosopher

had

no t

made

up

his

mind .

But

this

question-

namely, of the

relation

between ‘the state of mind’ an d its ‘object’-refirsed to be



eliminated,

as Jam es him self realized immediately after the publication of the

P r i t r c i -

ples , and more and mo re strong ly as the years passed. . . . Jam es was perpetually

being led, desp ite his profession of dualism and of metaphysical abstinence, to the

disclosure

of

a

homogeneous and continuous world.”

3 .

Cf. Robert R . Ehnlan, “W illiam Jam es and the Structure of the Self ,” i n New

Essays i n

Phenomerrology,

ed . James

M.

Edie (Chicago: Quadrangle

Books, 1969),

257: “The impor tan t po in t to ec is that identity for James is no t to be regarded as

a

postulated condition of the flux above

o r

behind it but rather found

in d n

immediate

felt contin uity an d rese mb lance o f the hases of the

flux

themselves.”

4.

Roderick Chisholm is a formidable defender

of

the reality of the Ego -subjec t.A

central notion

of

his

defense

involves what he calls “self-presenting” propositions,

which

I

interpret as som ething akin to fecl ing. Sce

Persort u r d Object

(La Salle,

I l l . :

Open C o u r t ,

1976), 112:

What is

a

rritpvion of personal identity?

I t is

a statement telling what constitutes

evidence of personal identity-what constitutes a good reason for saying of a per-

son x

that

he is. or t ha t

he

is

not, identical with a person

y o

Now therc

is.

after all,

a

fundamental distinction between the trrrrh-~orrdilio,lsof a proposition and the

m i

dence w c

an

have for

deciding whether or not

the

proposition is true. The

f r r r th-

conditions for

the proposition that Caesarcrossed the Rubicon

consist

o ft h e fact,

if

i t

is a fact, that

C aesa r

did cross the Rubicon. The

o n ly

eviderrt-e you and I c a n have

of this fact will consist of certain orher propositions-propositions about records,

memories, and traces.

It

is

o n ly

i n

the case

of

what

is

self-presenting

( that

I

hope

for

rain o r that i seem to me to have a headache) t ha t

t he

evidence for

a

proposition

conicides w ith its truth-conditions. In all other cases,

thc

two arc logically inde-

pendent; the one could

be

true while the other

is

false.

5. Cf.

Gerald

E.

Myers,

PP,

1:xxxvi: “Wh at makes the ideqtity

of

a given state

of

consciousness? Neither James the psychologist nor J a m e s the metaphysician could

provide the answer.

Th e

peculiar identity o r unity of a state o f consciousness

consists

of

a ‘diversity

in

continuity,’ and that can only

be j d t .

Such was the verdict ofJames

the mystic.”

It

is true, as w e shaIi see, that

James

does no t c la im to “explain”

just

wh y experie nce is as

it

is.

Myers’s

com m ent mi ght be misleading, however, i f i t is

understood

as

suggest ing that ‘ .James the mystic” emerged after

7atnes

the psychol-

ogist” and ‘ljarnes the metaphysician” had failed. As already noted and as will be

developed more fully later, James nsists o n taking my sticism serious ly precisely

because its experientiai claims are consistent with his metaphysics

f

experience.

6. Ralp h Bar ton Perry, I r l The Spirit o Willinm

Jn r ne s

(New Haven.

Conn.:

Yale

University Press,

1938), 86

(hereafter S W m .

7.

“Person

and

Personality,”

inJokrtsorr3

Uttiverstrl

Cyclopaedin (189 5), VI:539,

cited

inPerry, SWJ, 86. Cf. SPP, 5: “Expevientinlly, o u r personal dentityconsists,he

[Locke]

said,

in nothing m ore than the functional and perceptib le fact that o u r later

states

of mind cont inue

and

remember

o u r

earlier ones.”

8. T h o u g h articulated explicitly in E R E and PU, the seeds of this distinction be-

tween perceptual experience of the flux character of reality and conceptualization are

already presen t in PP. HereJam es in t roduces the metaphor “s t ream” to denote the

changing character of thought while a lso aff irming the unchanging character f o u r

concepts. Th e issue

of

the samenessof meanin‘g that can

be

“intended” by constant ly

changing mind is too complex t o be described in

a

few sentences.

I n

the chapters

“Conception” and “Necessary

Truths,”James

seems to unde rmine

is

reputation

as

a

philosopher of process and experience. In the former

he

states: “Each conception thus



eternally remains what t is, and never can beco me anoth er. .

.

.T h u s , a m i d t h elux of

opinions

and

of physical things, the world of conceptions,

o r

things intended

to

be

thou ght abo ut, stand s stil l and imm utable, l ike Plato’s Realm of Ideas” (PP, I:437).

Conce rn ing

the

dispute between cvolutionary empiricists and apriorists over the ori-

gin of “nec essary truths,” Jam es ells us that “on the whole . .

.

the account which the

apriorists give of the&cts is that wh ich I defend; a l though I should contend . .

.

for a

naturalistic viewof their

”

PP,

II:1216).

am es wo uld insist that in both instances

he is concerned anly with the m eanin g structu res of

the

mind and is not positin g

concepts or necessary truths

as

ontological realities. That the onlya priori acceptable

to him would have to be a kind of processive a priori

is

hinted at in the following:

“W hat similarity can there possibly be between human laws impo sed a p r i o r i

on

all

experience

a5

‘Iegislative,’ an d hu m an

ways

of thinking that

row

up piecemeal

a m o n g

the

details of experience because on the whole they w ork best?” ( le t ter

to

Hugo

Miinsterberg,

1905,

cited in TC, II:469).

9. Cf. Aron Gurwitsch , “Wil l iam James’ Theory of the ‘Transitive PJrts’ of the

Strcam

of

Consciousness,” in

Studies

itt

Plwnonzenology u r d Psychology

(Evanston, I l l . :

Northw estern Universi ty Press, 1966),

305n.:

“T her e is another mo dificat ion

ern-

phasized by Jam es himsdf y h ic h takes place when the stream of consciousness is

grasped and objectivated instead o f being simply experienced. W hereas the stream

itself is co ntin uo us

and

is experienced as su ch, the acts o f reflection by which certain

m o m e n t s o r

phases

are grasped

are

discrete. Bchind these discrete markings,howev-

er, the stream of

experience

goes

on continuously.”

Cf. PU, 106:

“T he s tages in to

which you analyze a change arestates’, the change itselfgoes on be tween them. I t lies

along their intervals, inhabits w hat your definition fails to gather up, and thus eludcs

conceptual explanation altogether.”

10. Thomas Reid ,

Essnys

on the

I n t e l I e c f d

Powers of M a n ,

1785;

cited n Perry,

Personal Zdctrtity, 107.

11.

A .

N.

Whitchcad,

Adverltures

c f I d e a s (New York: Free Prcss/Macmillan,

1967),

186.

12. For a fine exposition of the various expressions of wha t

they

call the “de-

ontological, or ‘no-self,’ parad igm ,” set:David D i lworth and HughJ. S i lverman, “A

Cross-Cultural Approach to the Dc-Ontological Paradigm,” in

ortisr 61, no.

(lan.

13.

Cf. James

M .

Edie, “Th c

Philosophical

Anthropo logy

of William James,”in

An I t w i r a r i o n t o

P h e r t o m e d o g y , ed . James M . Edie (Chicago: Quad rangle Books,

1965),

128:

“He can be read

as

an ‘egologist’ or

as

a ‘non-egologist’ ( though

1

believe

the

egological intcrpretation is more consonant wi th the tenor ofis philosophy as

a

whole, particularly since he continues t o speak elsewhere

of

the

exper i emi tg

ego

as

a

unified ‘self up to the endof his life).”

14. Cf. ibid., 127: “ T h e more fundanlcntal question involves asking who i t is

who

identifieshimself i n varyingdegreeswith hesedivers emp irical’ or ‘objective’

selves.AndJames heremeetsone of his most undamental phenomenological’

problems: the problem which Sartreaccs in ‘The Transcenden ce

of

the Ego,’ which

Merleau-Yonty discusses under the ‘lived Body,’ which Gilbert Ryle puzzles over in

his

chaytcr

on thc ‘Systematic elusiveness of the I,’ and which divides phenomeno-

logists into ‘egologists’ l ike Hu sserl and ‘non-egolog ists’ l ike Gu rwitsch.”

15.

James’s statem ent here cannot be accepted w ith ou t qualification.

T h e

signifi-

cant difference between

his

understanding of xperience and feeling and that of ear-

1978): 82-95.



258 Notes

to

Chapter 4

lier empiricists prohibits any identification of his philosophy with classical em-

piricism. Th is poin t has already been stressed and will become evident again w hen

we consider James’s rejection o f the associationist’s accou nt o f the self.

16. Cf. Milic Capek, “The Reappearance of the Self in the Last Philosophy of

William Jam es,” Philosophical Review 62 (1953): 536: “It wo uld be difficult to co ntra-

dict oneself m or e often with in a single sentence. D oes the ‘identifying section’ of the

stream no t belong to the s tream itself, that is to ‘the totality o f things collected’? In

what sense is it superior to them ? H ow can it collect, survey, own , o r disown the past

facts, as James claims in th e sub seq uent sentence, while it rem ains present, that is,

external

to th e past already gone ?”

17. Robert Nozick attempts to account for identity over time by his “closest con-

tinuer theo ry” w hich , th ou gh less metaphorical, is suggestive of James’s hypothesis:

“T he closest contin uer view holds that y at

t,

is the same person as

x

at

tl

only if,

first, y’s properties at

t2

s tem from, grow out of, are causally dependent on x’s

properties at

t ,

and, second, there is n o other z a t t, that stands in a closer (or as close)

relationship to x at t, than y at t, does” ( P E , 36-37).

18.

Cf.

A .

N. Whitehead, Modes of Thought (N ew York: Cap ricorn Books, 1958),

146: “C om pl et e self-identity can never be preserved in any advance to novelty.”

19. Cf. R ichard Stevens,

James and Husserl: The Fourtdafion

o

Meaning

(The Hague:

Martinus Nijhoff, 1974),

83:

“In their attempts to describe the peculiar identity of

the pure ego, b oth Husserl and James reject the model of objective iden tity w ithin a

succession of perceptual perspectives. Bo th maintain that the permanence o f the pur e

ego m ust be interpreted in terms o f function rather than of con tent.”

20. David Hume,

A

Treatise

o

Hutnuti Nature, 2d. ed., ed. L.

A .

Selby-Bigge

(O xfo rd: Clare ndo n Press, 1978), A ppe ndix , p. 636 (cited by James, b ut w ith ou t the

original italics, PP, 1:334).

21. Cf. C ape k, “Reappearance,” 536, w her e he com m ents o n this passage: “James

did not seem to realize that this criticism applied almost verbatim to his ow n notion of

‘the core

of

sameness running thr ou gh the ingredients o f the Self.’” Indebted as I am

to C apek’s article, I believe that h e has missed Jam es here. For James, the “tie” is not

“inexplicable” insofar as it is verified in experience. B y the sam e toke n, inasm uch as

experience an d /o r reality is constituted of “ties” or “connections,” there is no need

to go

behind

the phenomena to find the substance which does the tying or con-

necting.

22.

Cf. PP, I:268:

“

The re is

t i0

man$old ofcoexist ing ideas; the notion o f such a thing

is

a

chimera. Whatever thitigs are thought in relation are thoughtjom the outset in

a

unity,

in

a

sifiglepulse

of

subjectivity,

a

sittgle psychosis, feeli ng, or state ofmind.”

23. Capek, “Reappearance,” 541.

24. Ibid., 532-33; “T he true meaning of the article ‘Does Consciousness

Ex-

ist?’ . . . is a denial of the artificial separation of the act of consciousness from its

content. What James denies is a timeless, ghostly, and diaphanous entity, c om m on to

all individuals and consequently impersonal .”

25. Cf. the previously cited text, P B C , 175: “The I, or ‘pure ego’ .

.

. is that

which at any given moment is consciousness, whereas the Me is only one of the

things which it is conscious

of:”

This does not, I believe, conflict w ith m y claim that

the

“I”

and the “m e” are correlative and that it is not possible to have one w ith ou t

the other. The very possibility of distinguishing me-objects from non-me-objects

presupposes, of course, the reality of the “m e.”

26. Cf. Whitehead, Modes of Thought, 227-28: “Descartes’ ‘Co gito erg o sum ’ is



Notes to Chapter 5 259

w ron gly translated, ‘I thin k, therefore I am.’ It is never bare tho ug ht o r bare exis-

tence that we are aware of.

I find myself as essentially a unity o f em otions, enjoy-

ments, hopes, fears, regrets, valuations of alternatives, decisions-all of the m sub-

jective reactions to the env ironm ent as active in m y nature. M y unity-which is

Descartes’ ‘I am’-is m y process of shaping this welter o f material in to

a

consistent

pattern of feeling.”

27. Cf. Ludwig Wittgenstein,

Notebooks,

1914-1916, trans.

G.

E. M . Anscombe

(N ew York: Harpe r T orchbo oks, 1961), 80e:

Th e I, the I is wh at is deeply mysterious

T he I is no t an object.

I objectively con fron t every object. B ut n ot th e I.

So there really is a way in w hich there can and m ust be me ntion o f the

I

in

a non-

psychological sense

in philosophy.

28. A simpler example: If it is correct t o say that Joh nn y th row s the ball wit h his

arm , it is also correct to say simp ly that Joh nny thro ws the ball.

29. John Dewey,

Experience arid Nature

(New York: Dover, 1958),

208.

Cf. TC,

II:527: Perry cites Dewey’s letter to James in w hich he w rites positively of “th e wh ole

conception o f evolution as .

.

. reality which changes through centres of behavior

which are intrinsic and no t m erely incident.”

30. Cf . A . N . Whitehead, Process and R eal ity (N ew York: Hum anities Press, 1955),

254: “Apart from the experiences of subjects, there is nothing, nothing, nothing,

bare nothingness.”

31. Cf. E die,

Invitation,

130, wh ere he focuses on

“action

as the central category o f

James’ thou ght .”

32. Cf. Ian Barbour, Myths, Models, and Paradigms (N ew York: Harper Row,

1976), 158, wh ere h e describes th e “agent m ode l” developed un der the influence of

the “action” theorists: “An

actioti

is a succession of activities ord ere d towards an en d.

Its unity consists in an in ten tion t o realize a goal.

.

.

.

an action ca nn ot be specified,

then, by any set o f bodily mo vem ents, but o nly by its purpose o r intent.” Cf. also p.

139: “A person is an age nt as well as an activity,

a

centre of thought, intentionality

and decision, w h o can reveal himself to us in deliberate communication.”

33.

M i nd

4 (1879): 1-22.

34. Cf. TC, II:760, w here Perry cites the following no te w ritten by James in 1906:

“Since wo rk gets undeniably don e, a nd ‘we’ feel as if ‘we’ were do ing bits o f it, w hy,

for Heaven’s sake, th ro w aw ay the ria$impression.”

35. See also SPP, 109: “Meanwhile the concrete perceptual flux, taken just as it

comes, offers in our own activity-situations perfectly comprehensible instances of

causal agency. The ‘transitive’ causation in them does not, it is true, stick out as a

separate piece of fact for conception to fix upon. Rather does a whole subsequent

field gr ow continuou sly ou t o f a w hole antecedent field because it seems

to

yield new

being of the nature called for, wh ile the feeling of causality-at-work flavors the

entire concrete sequen ce as salt flavors the water in w hic h it is dissolved.”

36. Edie,

Invitation,

131.

C H A P T E R 5

1 .

To

get som e idea o f how thorny, obscure, and frustratingly elusive so m e o f

these questions were for James, see “ T he Miller-Bode O bjec tions ,” repr odu ced in

part in Ralph Barton Perry, The Thought and Character of Willi am James (Boston:



260 Notes t o Clrapter

5

Little, Brown,

193.9,

II:750-65, Appendix X (hereafter TC). This is a selection

made by Perry f rom notes tha t James kept be tween

1905 and

1908,

dealing with

object ions tohis doctr ine of “pure experience.” will draw liberally upon these notes

insofar as I think they support the processive-rela t ional

r

field metaphysics, implicit

inJames’s earl iest wri t ing, that becomes m ost unequivocal ly evident in A P l t rva l i s t i c

Utriverse.

2.

Cf.

ilic Capek, “The Reappearance of the Self

in

the Last Philosophy of

Will iamJamcs,” Philosophicarrl

Review

62 (1953):532: “James thus became

a

consistent

tempordist wi th all the consequen ces implied in this atti tude; temporality does be-

long, not only to the psychological world of thc ‘stream of thought ,’ but a lso to the

wh ole of reality.”

3 .

Cf. a lso

PU,

112:

“B ut i f, as metaphy sicians, we are more curious about the

inner nature o f reality or ab ou t wh at eally

rnnkes

if go,

we must

t u r n o u rbacks upon

our winged concepts a l together, and bury ourselvcs in the thickness of those passing

mo ments over the surface of wh ich thcy fly, an d on particular points of which they

occasionally test and perch.”

4.Cf. Gabriel Marcel, The

M y s r e v y

q f B e i t g ,

2

vols., trans. G.

S .

Fraser (Chicago:

Henry Regnery,

1950, 1951), I: 127:

“ Bu t i t is prccisely to the de gre e in w hich the

spectator is mo re than sim ply pectnrrs, it is to the degree to which he is also

particeps,

that the spectacle

s more

than a mere spectacle, that i t as some inner meaning--and

it is,

I

repeat , to the degree to which i t s more than a mere spectacle that

i t

can

give

rise to conte mp lation. And

o u r

term ‘participation’, even tho ug h it is so far for

us

no t much m ore than a makeshift , a bridge hastily th ro w n across certain gaps in o u r

argum ent, indicates precisely this ‘som ething m ore’ that has to b c added to th e sim-

ple recording o f inlpressions before contemp lation can arise.”

5. Cf.

V R E ,

341:

“I

d o believe that feeling is the deeper source o f religion , and that

philosophic and theological formulas are secondary products, like translations o f a

t ex t in to another tongue . .

.

In

a world

in which n o religious feeling had ver existed,

I

doubt whether any phiIosophic theology could ever have been framed.

.

.

.

These

speculations must, i t seems to me,e classed as over-beIiefs, buildings-out per for m ed

by the intellect into direction s of which feeling originally supplied

the

hin t .”

6.

Cf.

Elizabeth Flower and Murray

G.

Murphey,

,4

History ofPhilosophy i r t 14mer-

ica, 2

vols. (N ew York : Capr ico rn

Books, 1977),

471: “If as we expe ct him /James] to

do by this t ime, o ne su bst i tutes a continuity over t ime for an identi ty o f substance,

then the conditionsof contin uity wo uld be atisfied if the experienceof the present n

some cum ulative sense captured past experience. Just as the present state o f a plant

incorporates i ts past growth,

so

the present thought owns o r represents all that

has

gone before.”

7. The com plex ques t ionof continuity-discontinuity cannot be entered into here.

W hile it was a relatively unfinished ques tion in Jam es, Perry sugg ests that he was

working toward a more adequa te express ion of

the

senses in which the temporal

world

is

bothcontinuousanddiscontinuous:“Thathewouldno t have efthis

‘abrupt increments of novelty’ unrelieved

is clear.

O n e m ay surmise that he

would

have described

a sequence of

happenings in which events occur like strokesr pulses,

with a th rust

of

their own ; but in w hich they wou ld at t he same t ime be continu-

ous-in the sense of conjunction or nextness, rather than in the senseof connection.

Their continuity wou ld not consist in the l ink between them , but in the

absence

of

any such interm ediary. Being thus in direct contact, they would be subject to ‘os-

mosis’” (TC,11566).



Notes

to

Chapter 5

261

It should be noted that t ime is not a mathem atical continuum for Jam es; rather, i t

comes in d iscont inuous “drops” or “pulses .”

Cf. SPP, 80:

“On the theory

of

discon-

t inui ty, t ime, change, e tc . , would grow by f ini te buds or drops, e i ther nothingorn-

ing

at all, o r certain units

of

amoun t bu rs t ing in tobeing ‘at

a

stroke.’

”

But “d iscon-

t inui ty”

is

no t thc wh ole sto ry, f or all experiences also have

a

dinlcnsion of contin-

uity, as is eviden ced in James’s d oc trin e

of

the specious present

in

which we grasp

imm ediately he eceding past andemerg ingfu ture . “ T h e tiniest eeling w e can

possibly have comcs with an earlier anda later part and wit h a sense

of

their continu-

ous procession” ( P U , 128). Tim c, th en, is continuous insofar as cach m om ent gro ws

immedia te ly (wi th out g ap) o ut of the last m o m e n t and will grow imm edia te ly in to

the next. T im e is discontinuous insofar as it corncs in d r o p s or strokes or pulses-in

h i t c bits.

8. Cf.

P U ,

87n.:

“ I

hold

it still as the best description

of

an

e n o r m o u s

number

of

our highe r ields o f consciousness. The y dem onstrab ly

d o

not

iontaitl

the lower

tares

that k n o w thesameobjects. Of other fields,however, his is n o t so t rue , . . . I

frankly withdrew, n principle, my former object ion

to

talking

of

f ie lds of con-

sciousness being made of sim pler ‘pa rts,’ leaving the facts t o decide the que stio n in

each specia1 case.”

9. Brucc Kuklick, The Rise

ojAmcricat l

Philosophy ( N e w Haven,

Conn.:

Yak

Uni-

versity Press, 1977), 331.

10.

I t

has

been

frequently noted that the str ic turesJames a t t r ibutes to the

logic

of

identity do no t ho ld gainst the logic of relations developed in the twentieth century.

Cf. Marcus PeterFord, William

j a m ~ s ’ s lzilosoplry

(Amherst : Universi ty

of

Mas-

sachusetts Prcss,

1982),

106-7:

T he logic of identity p resupp oses that concre te actualities can

be

dcfincd solely in

terms o f changeless universals. Consequ ently, concre te actualitics are themselves

considered to be changeless.

A

thing is forever

just

what it is. Moreover, because

concrete things can be defined solely

in

terms of universals, the rclation between

on e concrete hing and anothe r is not esscntial to either actuality. Relations arc

purely accidental.

.

.

.

The logic

of‘

elations, which includes the logic of identity.

affrrrns what the logic of identity denies,

L e . ,

that a subject may enter into and

affect ano ther sub ject. Because certain kind s of relations are internal to one term

and external to the other, subjects may include other subjects.

T h e

relations of

knowing, loving, or hating include what is known, loved, or hated-knowing x,

loving

y, hating

z .

The

eRect ncludes t he causc or , m or e generally stated, the

feeling-of-x must include

x

otherwise i t is merely the feeling-of-.

11. T h e relevance of all this to th e earlier field model of the self

as

a complex o f

conscious and nonconscious fields shifting and overlapping is ob vio us.

12. The se passages lend supp ort to interpret ing

James

as a panpsychist . 1 have

already “dodged” this quest ion

y

suggest ing that “panact ivism”

s

a

less

problenled

term for describing James’s metaph ysics than “pan psyc hism .”

13.

Cf.

Ford,

Jarnes’s

Philosophy,

87: “ T h e p a r a d o x

of

something be ing both

ex

and

LO

another actuality is no paradox a t all when seen from a process perspective. What

was

once ex may be co in a subsequen t mom ent .” Cf. also Perry, TC,

I:664:

“ Bu t

once the logic of identi ty is abandoned, it is permissible to say that tw o successive

events bo th are and are no t identical : the f i rst develops into the second, the s econd

emerges from the fi rst . There is novelty, bu t i t is a novelty which, when i t comes,

seems m utual and reasonable, l ike the fulfil lment of a tendency. This notion

of

a

‘really gro win g wo rld’ is the gene ral heme of the atter part of the Problems sf

Philosophy.”



262 Notes

t o Chapter

5

14. Cf. James in TC, 11:757:

“ 1

find that I involuntarily think

of

lo-ness under the

physical im ag e of sort

of

lateral suffusion fro m on e thin g into an oth cr,ike a gas or

warmth , o r l i gh t . The l n c e s involved are fixed, but what fills one place radiates and

suffuses into the other by

.

.

‘endosmosis .’ This seems

to

ally itself w ith th e fact

that all consciousness

is positional,

is

a

‘point of view,’ measures things for a

here,

etc. .

.

.”

15. C f , P U ,

121:

“The absolu tc is said t o pe rfo rm i ts feats by taking up i ts othcr

into tself. Bu t hat is exactly what is done when every ndividual

morsel of

the

sensational stream takes

up

the adjacent morscls by coalescing w ith the m . T his is

just what we mean by the stream’s set lsibk continuity.o element

thew

cuts itselfoff

f rom any other e lement ,

as

concepts cut chemselvcs from concepts. N o a r t

there

is

so small as not to be a place of conflux. No part there is no t really

r1e.uf

its neighbors;

which

means

that there

is

l itera lly nothing b ctween; w hich m eans that

no

part goes

exactly so far and

no

farther; that

n o

part absolutely cxcludes another, but that they

com penetrate and are cohesive; if you tear out one, i ts roots bring out m ore with

them; that whatever

is

real is telescoped and diffused into other rcals.”

16. Cf. also P U ,

104:

“All-felt times coexist and overlap or com pen etra te each ot he r

thus vaguely; but the artificcof plo t t ing them on a co m m on scale helps us to reduce

their aboriginal confusion.’’

17. Cf . L e w i s T h o m a s , The Mcd~rsa

rld

t h e

Stmil

(New York :Bantam Books,

1980),

10-12:

“If there

is

life there, you will find co nsor tia, colIab orating grou ps,

working part ies,

all

over the place. . .

.

I t is beyond our im aginat ion to conceive o f a

single form of

life that exists alone and independent, unattached to ot he r

forms.

. . .

Everything herc is alive thanks to the living of everything else. All the forms of life

are connected. .

. .

Wc a r e c o m p o n e n t s i n a dense, fantastically com plicated systcnl

o f life, w e are enmeshed in the interl iving, and

we

really don’t k n o w what wc’re

u p

to .”

18. Cf. Gerald E . Myers ,

PP,

1:xxxv-xxxvi: “He confcsscd hat neither he nor

anyone else could explain how the peculiar identity and unity o f a state

of

con-

sciousness can result fro m

a

combina t ion

of

elements.

I n

ou r experience we

do

find

the concept ‘diversity and m ultiplicity

in

unity’ fulfil led, but w e cannot explain it .

T hi s is becausc, i n the very effort to conceptual ize those mom ents wherein w e find

unity composed of diversity, we break

up

the unity; our concepts keep things sepa-

rated, whereas o u r experience f inds them ogether in a unity and continuity that can-

not

be

conceptual ized. Thus, the sort of continuity that pervades

a

pure experience,

that characterizes the diversityof a state of consciousncss, that connects hum an xpe-

riences t o God’s, cannot be described.”

I have cited Myers’s

fine

i n t roduc t ion to the PrirzripIes scveral times,

for,

a s the

citations indicatc, he locates thePrinciples within the larger context ofJames’s philos-

ophy wi th which I am concerned. I regret that his ful l- length study ofJames,

William

James:

His Life

atrd

Thought ( N e w

Haven, Conn., 1986),

was not available du ring the

period in w hich m y essay was co m po sed . Myers’s impressive w o r k is thc most com-

prehensive treatment ofjames’s life

and

tho ug ht yet wri t ten, and it is likely to rem ain

so for some t ime .

19. Cf. Ralph Barton Perry, The

Spiri t of

WillinrnJnrnes (Ne w Havcn. Conn.: Yale

University Press, 1938), 115-16:

Perry

points out that James escaped the paradox of

one ent i ty being “in

ome

sense

both identical

and

non-identical with another

.

.

by

taking the concrete en tity

as

an integrated complex which by overlapping another



could be both identica l with that other as regards their comm unity, and also non-

identical as regards their individualities and private remainders.”

20.

See above, page

104.

21.

Cf.

Y R E ,

191:

“In

the wonderful explorat ions by Binet , Janet , Breuer, Freud,

Mason, Prince, and others, of the subliminal consciousnessf patients with hysteria,

we have revcaled to us whole system s of underground life, in the shape of memor ie s

o f a painfu l s ort wh ich lead a parasitic existence, buried outside the p rimary fieldsof

consciousness.”

22.

I t

is doubtful whether a lmost thrce-quarters

f

a cen tury later w e can

be

said to

be mu ch “ fu r ther” thanJam es.For a more recent consideration of parapsychological

claimsby on e wh o l ikeJames

is

symp athet ic but a lsoreaches a “very open and

uncertain” conclusion, see Jo h n H i c k , “ T h e Co n t r ib u t i o n of Parapsycholog y,” in

Death u r d E t e r r d

Life

(New

York: H arp er Row,

1976), 129-46.

23. Cf. the

T.

H. Huxley ,“LifeandLetters,” I,

240,

cited

by

James in“Final

Impressions

of

a PsychicalResearcher,”

M S ,

185-86: “But supposing hese phe-

nomena to begenuine-they do no t n terest me . I f anybod y would endow m e wi th

the faculty oflisten ing to the chatterof old women and curates in the nearest provin-

cial town, I should decline the privilege, having better things to do. An d if the folk

of the spiritual world d o n o t alk m or e wisely and sensibly than their friends report

them to

do,

I put then1

in

the same ca tegory . Th e on ly

good

that 1 can see in th e

demonstration

of

the

‘Tru th

of

spiritualism’

is

to

furnish an addit ional argum ent

again st s uicidc. Be tter livc a crossing-sweeper, than die and bc m ad e to talk twaddle

by a ‘medium’ h i red a t a guinea a

S e a f m . ”

In fairness, such parapsychologica claims

as those of extrasensory perception and clairvoyance should be d istinguished from

“spir i tual ism” and “mediumship.” But apart

rom

the question of their authenticity,

there stiI1 seems to be a significant qualitative difference in t he lives of t hose who

appa rently possess such powers and those recognized as “m ystics.”

24. W illiam Jam es,

Z l k s

to Tearhers ( N e w Yo rk : N o r t o n ,

1958),

34.

25.

T ha t this is not merely an anti- or nonintelIectual emotive expression on

the

part

ofJames

is

well

noted

by

Marian

C.

M a d d e n

a n d

Edward

€3.

Madden

in

their

c o m m e n t on t h s text:

“It was

not only the

will

to believ e w h c h heIped mbrace

the free-will view bu t also the

rcmoval

of th e belief, on good evidence, in the autom-

aton theory. Indeed, the

w i l l

to believe that on e is free was not eno ug h for James by

any means. Th at opt ion had to

be

made a live

one

for h i m

by

honestly eliminating

the automaton theory, done

by

hard intellectual labor.

His

respect for scientific evi-

dence had to be

met,

and it was” (“The Psychosomatic IlInesses

of

William J am es,”

Thought, Dec. 1979, p.

392).

26. Cf. also P, 60: “Free will pragmatically means novelties in t he

worid,

the r ight to

expect that in its deep est elem ents as w ell as in ts surface phenomena, the future may

not identically repeat and imitate the past.”

27. T h r e e of the four experiences were sim ilar in character, the fourth being a

disturb ing dream that recurre d ove r several nights. T h e waking experiences are the

focus of my conc ern, but James’s conclusion regarding the dreams is well wor th

noting: “The distressing confusion

f

mind in this experience was the exact opposite

of my stical i l lumination, and equally unrnystical was the definiteness of what was

perceived. B u t the exaltation of the sense of relation was mystical (rhe perplexity

al l

revolved abo ut the fact that the three dreams

6 0 t h

did

a d

did

riot

belor1g

in

thc

most

intimate

way together);

and the sense that eality

was beirtg

uncovered was mystical in the



264

Nota

fo Clrapter 5

highest degree. Tu this day

I

feel that those extra dream s w erc dream edn reality, but

when, whcre , and by whom, I cannot guess” ( C E R , 511).

28.

D.

C. Mathur, Nurrrvtrlistic Philosophies of Expcrierlce (St. Louis, Mo.: Warren

H.

Green,

1971),

62.

29.

Cf.

V R E ,

157-58.

Though James here a t t r ibutes an experience ofmetaphysical

terror t o an anonymous F renchman ,

he

later a dm itted it

was

his own.

30. Cf. TC,

II:346: “I have n o mystical experience of m y ow n, bu t

us t

enough

of

the germ of mysticism in me to recognize the region from which their [ s i c ] voice

comes when

I

hear it.” See also, TC, I1:350: “ I have no l iving sense of commerce

wi th a G o d . . . . Al though I a m so devoid of

Gortesbewusstsein

in the directer

a n d

stronger sense, yet there is

sonrething

i n me which

makes rexpome

w h e n I hear utter-

ances from that quarter made by others.” John Sm ith considers this last sta tement

“the key to the resolut ion of whatever paradox is involved” in James being “con-

vinced

at

second-hand that only first-hand experience in religion represents the gen-

uine article” ( V R E , xvi) .

31. Cf. W B , 223: “No part of the unclassified residuum has usuaily been treated

wi th

a more contemptuous scient if ic disregard than the mass of phenomena gener-

allycalled mysfical.

.

.

.

All thewhile ,however, hephenomenaare here , ying

broadcast over the surface

of

history.”

32. Cf.

V R E , 58-59:

“Such

cases, taken alo ng wi th

others

which would be too

tedious for quotation, seem suffkiently to prove the existence in o u r mental

ma-

chinery of a sense of present reality m or e diffused and general than that which our

special senses yield.”

33. James will later suggest that f the wo rd “sublim inal” s offensive “smclling too

much o fpsychical rcsearch or other aberrat ions,” then one might speakf the A- and

the B-region o f personality. T h e A-region is “t he level o f full sunlit consciousness.”

T he larger

B-region “is the abode of everyth ing that is latent

and

the reservoir of

everything that passes unrecorded and unobserved. I t contains, for example, such

thin gs as all our momentari ly inact ivememories, and it harbors the springsof a11 o u r

obscurely

motivedpassio ns, mp ulses, likes, dislikes,andprejudices.

O u r

intui-

tions, hypotheses, fancies, superstit ions, persuasions, convictions, and in gen eral all

our non-rational operations, co m e fro m it”

( V R E ,

381).

34.

Cf. Perry, TC, 11:273: “Again he discovered that men find within themselves

unexpected resources upon which to draw in times

of

danger

or

privation. There is

thus acom m on thread unning hrough James’ observat ions on religion,neu-

rasthenia,war,earthquakes,fasting, ynching,patriotism-an nterest,namely, n

hum an behavior under high pressure , and the conclusion that exceptional c ircum-

stances generate ex ceptional inner power. These phenom ena have a bearing on rneta-

physics because such ex ceptional power suggests the sudden removalof a barrier and

the tappings

of

a greater reservoir

of

consciousness.”

35. Cf. WB, 237:

“ T h e

result is to m ak e m e feel that we all have a potentially

‘subliminal’ self, wh ich m ay m ake a t any t ime irruption into o ur o rdinary lives. A t

its lowest,

it

is

only the deposi tory of

o u r

forgotten memories; a t i ts highest, we do

no t kn ow what it is

at

all.”

36.

Cf. Patrick Kiaran Dooley,

Pragmatism

as

Htrrnanism

(Totowa, N.1.: Littlefield,

Adams,

1975), 159:

“Even t hough

he

felt that the existence

of

the self was required

by

man’s ethical religious experiences, he maintained

that

the

self

was

only experi-

enced

as cephaiic movementsof adjustment . Jamesnow proposed that this self, expe-

rienced as

muscular

adjustment , was only a por t ion

of

a wider

self.

Mo reover, the



Notes

to Chapter

5 265

wider self was experienced in ethical and religious experiences wherein the widerelf

moves fromhe eripherysubconsciou s wareness)

to

the enterconscious

awareness).”

37.

From

an

essay

on

subliminal consciousness written by Frederick M yers

in

1892

and published in Proceedir-rgs

o f f h e S a c i e t y f o v

Aychicnl Restwrh

7:305.

T h e c on -

geniality of this text to the kind of field-self suggested in this essay is quite evident.

38. lames

was quite aware that in encouraging speculations such as Fechner’s, on e

was opening a Pandora’s b ox . Cf. P U , 142: “ I t

is

true that superstit ions and w ild

gro w ing over-beliefs of all sorts w il l undoubtedly beg in to abound

if

the not ion of

higherconsciousnessesenvelopingours, of fechnerianearth-soulsand he like,

grows

orthodox and fashionable . .

.

But ough t one se r iously to a llow such a t imid

consideration as that to de ter one

from

following the evident path of greatest re-

l igious promise? Since when, in this mixed world, was any go od given us in purest

outline and isolation? One of the characteristics of life is redundancy, . . + Every-

thing is sm othere d in the li t ter that is fated to accom pany it . W ithout too m u c h you

cannot have ctzough

of

anyth ing .”

39. Someth ing similar is suggested by Charles Sanders Peirce:

A friend of

mine,

in consequence of

a

fever, totally

lost

his sense of

hearing.

He

had been v e r y fond of music before his calamity; and, strange to say, even after-

wards would love to stand by the piano when

a good

perform er played.

So

then,

I

said to him, after all you can hear a little. A bsolutely no t, h e replied; but

I

canfEd

the

music all

over m y body. Why,

I

exclaimed, how

is it

possibie fora new sense

to

be

developed in a few months

I t

is not a new

sense,

he answered. Now that my

hearing is gone I can recognize that alway s possessed this mode

of

consciousness,

which I formerly, with oth er people, mistook for hearing.

In

the same m anner,

when the carnal consciousness passes away

in

death, we shall a t

once

perceive that

we have had all

along

a lively spiritual consciousn ess which

we have

been confus-

ing with something different.The Collected P u p s of

Chmles

Sanders

Peircc,

8 vols.,

ed.CharlesHartshorne, PaulWeiss,

and

Arthur

W. Burks

[Cambridge,Mass.:

Harvard U niversity Press,

1931-35,

19581, VU,

par.

577)

40.

In

a

le t ter wri t ten short ly after the publicat ion

of

V R E ,

James

stated:

“ l

think

that the fixed pointw i t h m e s the conviction that

our

‘rational’ consciousness touch-

es but a portion

of

the real universe and that

our

life is fed by the ‘mystical’ region

s

well” (cited in TC, Il:346).

41.

Cf.

the British analytic philosopher,

H .

H. Price’s ‘*Survival and the Idea of

‘Another World,’” in Lariguuge, Metaphysics, nrtd D e d z , e d . j o h n D o n n e l l y ( N e w

York: Fordham U niversity Press, 1978),

194:

“ l f th ere a re o ther wor lds han h is

(again I emphasize the ‘ i f ) ,who knows whe the r w i th

some

s t ra tum

of

o u r person-

alities we are not l iving in them now , as well as in this present

one

which conscious

sense-perception discloses?’’

42.

Cf.

Perry, TC, 11576-77: “Th is bel ief was to som e extent founded on norma l

observation, o n the reports of others , and on the theory

of

the subliminal con-

sciousness which he adopted from M yers. But the impression is irresistible that it

was his

own

unusual experiences hat put he seal of convic t ion on what wou ld

otherwise have been an alluring but open hypothesis.”

43. If we read so m e of the more arcane Jamesian texts within such a field meta-

physics, I believe we rend er them a bit

more

plausible. Try it, for examp le, singly

and together, with

two

just-cited texts-“millions

of

years later,

a

similarly retro-

spective experience, should any com e to birth . . I ’ and “a con t inuum of cosmic

consciousness.

.

.

.”



266 Notes fo Chpter 6

44.

In a

text written more than twenty years earlier, there is an anticipation f this

“collectivism of personal lives,” though with a more abstract and less dynamic

fla-

vor:

“If idealism be true, the great question that presents itself is whether its tru th

involve henecessity of an nfinite,unitary,andomniscientconsciousness,

o r

whether a republic of semi-detachedconsciousnesseswilldo,-consciousnesses

united by a certain common fund of representations, but each possessing a private

store which the others do not share” (“ O n Som e Hegelisms,” W B , 215).

45.

Cf.

also TC, I:526:“Nihilismdeniescontinuity. Of the woelementsof

change it says one does not exist

a t all till

the o ther has ceased etltirely. Com m on

sense lets one thing run into another and exist potentially or in substance whcre its

antecedent

is, alIows

continuity.” Cf. also

p. 527:

“Substance metaphysicalIy consid-

ered

denotes no thing more than this: ‘it

is

nrecrrrt,’

apllrs ul tm the phenomenon. What

this

plus

may be

is

lefr undecided;

i t

may be a noumenal world,

i t

may only be other

phenomena with which the present real one is related,-it may, in

a

word, denote

merely the ~onti t trr i ty

of

the real world.”

46.

In

positing a substantive sameness as characterizing the self, we must keep in

mind the distinctive features ofJames’sdoctrine of personal identity described in the

last chapter, in particular, the mode

of

“sameness” that is experientially warranted.

Cf.

PP,

:318: “The past and present selves compared are the sameust so far forth

as

they are the same, and no farther.”

CHAPTER

6

I .

C. Stephen Evans, Subjectivity and Religious Belief(Washington, D. C.: Univer-

sity Press of America, 1982),

142.

The most dramatic expression

of

the metaphysical

and ethical implications attached to the God-question is Nietzsche’s famous parable

of the “Death of God.” What Nietzsche so brilliantly and terrifyingly illustrates is

that the loss of belief in the traditional

God

is

not

restricted in its implications o the

undermining

of

the classical arguments for the existence of God, nor even to the

denial of the existence of some transcendent Being. Rather, the “death of God”

involves the dissolution

of

that view of reality upon which the most important and

central institu tions and values

of

Western civilization were grounded.

2. Paul Tillich, The

Dynamics

ofFaith (New York:Harper Torchbooks, 1958),45:

“Whatever we say about that which concerns us ultimately, whether or not we call it

God, has a symbolic meaning. It points beyond itself while participating in that to

which it points. In

n o

oth er way can faith express itselfadequately. The language of

faith is the language

of

symbols.”

I

wish to add that the symbolic character of Gad-language applies particularly to

the use of the masculinepronouns

“he”

and “him.” I have followed customary West-

ern usage throughout simply because I could think

of no

alternative that would not

be cumbersome and distracting.Needless to say, God is no more nor less “he” than

“she”;

nor,

perhaps, than “it.”

3. It is not only those working explicitly ou t of the pragmatic tradition who reject

this simplistic dichotomy.

Cf.

the sociologist of religion Robert Bellah’s “Religion in

the University: Changing Consciousness, Changing Structures,”

in

Claude Welch,

ed . ,

Religion in the Ude r g r u d u n t e Curricrrfum (Washington,

D.C.:

Association of

American Colleges, 1973,

14:

For

the

religiously

orthodox

reiigious

belief

systems were

felt

to

represent

“objec-

tive” reality

as

i t really is, and thus

if

one of them is true

the

others must be false,



Notes

to

Chapter

6

267

either absolutely or in some degree. For the secular orthod ox all religion is merely

“subjective,”based on emotion, wish o r faulty inference, and therefore

false.

For

the third group,

who take

symbolism seriously, religion is seen as a system of

symbols which is neither simply objective nor simply subjective but

which

links

subject and object in

a

way that transfigu res reality o r even, in a sense, creates

reality. For people

with

this point

of

view the idea of finding more than one re-

ligion valid, even in a deeply personal sense, is not only possible but normal. This

means n either syncretism nor relativism, since

i t is

possibIe within any

social or

personal context t o develop criteria for the evaluation

of

religious phenomena and

consequent hierarchy

of

choices.

4. Cf. Paul Ricoeur, Freedom and Nature, trans.

Erazim

V. Kohik

(Evanston, Ill.:

Northw estern Universi ty Press, 1966),

476:

“At th is poin t Orphic Poe t ry [Goethe ,

Rilke, Nietzsche] leaves us unsatisfied. I t conceals a great temptat ion, the temptat ion

t o

lose

ourselves as subjectivity

and

to sink in the great metam orphosis.

.

.

.

I t

is

no

accident that Orp hism tends to a naturef worship in which the unique sta tus f the

C og ito evaporates in the cycleof the mineral and the animal.’’

5.

Ralph Barton Perry, T h e Thought

u r d

CItaracfPrc j WilliamJurnes,

2

vols. (Boston:

Little, Brown,

1935). II:358-59

(hereafter Tc).

6 .

See

also

P,

40-41: “iftheolog ical ideas prove

to

have valuefor concrete life, they will be

true, for pragmatism , n the sense o f b e k g

good fo r

so

much. For how much more they are true,

will depend entirely or1 thcir relations to the other truths that also have

t o

be acknowledged.”

7.

Cf.

TC,

1~273:

Again he discovered that men find within themselves unex-

pected resources upon which to draw

in

t imes of dange r or privation. . .

.

These

phen om ena have a bearing’on m etaphy sics because such exceptional power suggests

the sudden removal of a barrier and he appings

of

a greater reservoir of con-

sciousness; and they have bearing on ethics, since this power differs in degree rather

than

in

kind fro m that mo ral power-that f ight ing and adventurous spir i t , that hero-

ic quality-which gives to life the color and radianc e o f value.”

8. T h e passage elided reads, “So a ‘god o fbattles’ must be allowed for one kind of

person,

a

g o d

of

peace and heaven a nd home, t he god for another.” I have dro pp ed it

because it distracts fr om th e richness ofJames’s pluralistic perspective

by

giv ing the

impression

that all gods m u s t be al lowed. This

is

in sharp opposi t ion

o

his view that

we m ust evaluate all claims, including religious on es, on the basis of their experien-

tial fruits. I submit that whatever limited fruits belief in a

“ g ~ d

f bat tles” bro ug ht

forth a t an earl ier t ime, the overwhelm ing historical evidence pointso i ts now being

an unacceptable belief.

9.

For

a recognition

of God’s

pluralistic relationship to t he human communi ty

from a biblical perspective, cf. Clark M. WilIiarnson, Has God Rejected

His

People?

Anti-Judaism in

the

Chr is t ian

Church

(Nashvil le , Tenn.: Abingdon, 1982),

64:

“If

o n e

assumes hat G o d affects the

world

by

offeringditferentpossibilit ies to di ge re nt

peoples in different times and places, then we mayf i r m t ha t God wills diversity and

pluralism.” W hile not in conflict with a plu ralism such

s

that suggested by William-

son the pluralism presented by James is m o re personalistic than cultural. It is the

diversity of personal needs present evena t the same t ime and in

he same

culture that

James refers to several times in the

h r i e t i e s

(in addition to V R E , 384, ju st c i ted, see

also pp. 115, 136,

127).

Further, James do es not restrict pluralism

to

that of “re-

ligious” types. In a passage left o u t of earlier published versions of the

Varieties,

James

states: “The first thing that str ikes

us

is that the reIigious m an in the sense used

in

these lectures is only one type of man. Round about him are o ther men who say



they canno t realize this exper imen tal com me rce with the divine ; and taken collec-

tively there is no flagrant difference of w or th in the tw o classes of persons. . . . No

one type of man whatsoever

is

the total fullness

of

truth imm ediately revealed. Each

of us ha s o bo r ro w

rom

the other parts

f

tru th seen better from the other’s point of

view”

( V R E ,

383).

10.

This is

a

variation on th e fo llo w ing : “B ut rationality has at least four dimen-

sions, intellectual, aesthetical, moral, and practical; and to find a wo rld ratio nal to

the m a x i m a l d e g r e e it1 all these respects simwltnneously is no easy matter” (PU, 55).

1 1 . “T he best fruits of religious experience are the best thin gs,t hat h isto ry has to

show” ( V R E , 210). “Religious rapture , moral enthusiasm, ontological wonder,

cos-

mic emot io n , a re

a l l

unifying states

of

mind, in which thc sand and gr i t o f

elfhood

incline to disappear, and tenderness to rule” (C’RE, 225). Hans Kiing takes a position

similar to that ofjarnes w hen he p oints out that the existence of needs, desires, and

wishes

do

no t prove hat here is a fulfillingrealitycorresponding o hem, bu t

neither does their existence exclude such a possibility:

“To

be more precise, could

not the s e t w e ofdependerlce and the itzstinct ofse lfpreservnt ion have a very r e n l ground ,

could no t our

strivirzgfor

hnpyirlesr have a very

real

goal?”

Kung

the n cites a text from

Edw ard von Hartmann w hich denies that the psychological dimension of

a

belief

renders

it

untrue :

“ I t

is quite true that nothing exists merely ecause we wish i t , bu t

it is not t rue that something cannot exist f

we

wish it . Feuerbach’s wh ole critique

of

reIigion and the whole proof

of

his atheism, however, rest o n this single argu me nt;

that is, o n a logical faIlacy” (Han s Kiing , Efernnl L$ t r ans. Edward Qu inn [New

York: Doubleday, 19841, 30-31).

12.

For a contra ry

view

presented within a semi-playful context ,

see

Stanislaw

Lem, “Non Serviam,” n

The h4ind’s

1, ed. Dougla s R. Hofstadter and Daniel C.

D e n n e t t ( N e wYork: Basic Books, 1981),313: “Living , we p lay the gam eof life, and

in

it

weare a llies, every one. The rew ith, he

game

between us isperfectly sym-

metrical.

in

postula t ing God, we postulate a continuat ion of the game beyond the

world.

1

believe hat on e sho uld be allowed to postulate his continuation of the

game,

so

lon g as it does not in any way nfluence he course

of

the game here .

Otherw ise , for the sake of someo ne who perhaps does not exist we may well be

sacrificing that which exists here, and exists for certain.”

13. For a strikingly similar image constructed by a thinker who is at the opposite

pole

fiomJames

concerning the value

of religion,

see Friedrich Nietzsche,

Tlte

Will

to

Power, trans. Walter K a u h a n n and

R.

J. H o h g d a l e , ed. Walter K a h a n n ( N e w

York: Vintage Books,

1967),

40: “Disintegrationcharacterizes his ime,and hus

uncerta inty: nothing stands f i rmly

on its feet o r

on

a hard faith in itself; o ne lives

for

t o m o r r o w as the day a fter to m or ro w is dubio us. Eve rything on our way is slippery

and

dang erous , and the ice that st il l supports

us

has become thin:

all

of

us

feel

the

warm , uncanny breath of the thawing wind; where we walk, soon no on e will be

able

to

walk .”

14. Cf. V R E , 367: “The genuineness of religion is thus indissolubly bound up

with the quest ion whether the prayerful consciousness be or be not decei tful. T h e

con victi on tha t som eth ing is genuinely transacted in this consciousness is the very

core of living religion.”

15.j o h n Smith c la ims that “ the importance toJarnes’s argument

of

his extension

of

faith to include God and the ideal

order has

n o t been_ sufficiently appreciated.”

According to

Smi th ,

“James

was calling attention to the pervasive religious belief



Notes tu Chapter

6 269

that the ‘More,’ however conceived, s never tho ug ht

of as

present only n the experi-

ence

of the individual but is cnvisaged

as

at work in the cosmos in t h c f o r m

of

a

divine order” ( V R E , xlvii-xlix).

16.

Paul Ed wa rds, “A theism ,” in

The

Elrcyclopedin ofPhilusoplry,

8

vols.,

ed. Paul

Edw ards (New Yotk: Free Press/Macrnil lan,

1967), I:187.

17, Henry Sam uel Levinson, T h e Religiolrr Irlvestirgatiorrs uf WilliamJames (Chapel

Hill : Un iversi ty of North C arol ina Press,

1981),

192 (hereafter

RIWJ).

18. In a let ter toJ am es c om m ent ing on re ligion in

A

Plrrrolisfir Ut t iuerse, Bertrand

Russellnoticed “one purcly emp eramental difference: hat the first dem and you

make of your God

is

that you should

be

able to love

h im,

whereas m y f irs t demand s

that I should be able to worship h im” ( InJarnes ,

M T ,

Append ix

IV. 303).

19.

C f . P U ,

28: “Th e

doctrine on which heabsolutists lay m ost stress is the

absolute’s ‘timeless’ character.

For

pluralists , o n the other hand,

t irnc

remains

as

real

as anything, and nothing in the universe is great o r

static

or e ternal enough n o t t o

have som e history.”

20.

W illiam James, “R eason and Faith,”

Jounrnl ufPhilosophy

24

(1924):197.

21. As early 3s 1882,James quest ioncd theneed for an all-inclusive God. In

a

Ietter

to Thomas Dav idson , he wro te : “ I t is a curious thing this matter

of

God

.

.

I

find

myself less and

less

able

to

d o w i t h o u t h i m . He need not be an all-including ‘subjec-

tive unity of the universe.’

. .

.

All I

mean is that there must be

sowe

subjective unity

in the universe which has purposes comm ensurable with my

own,

and which

is

at

the same ime a rge enough

to

be, among al l the pow ers hat may be

there,

the

strongest. I simplyrefuse to accept the no tion of there being no purpose n he

objective world.

. . .

In say ing ‘G od exists’ all

I

imp ly is that m y

purposcs

are cared

for by a mind so pow er fd as on the wh o leo contro l the dr i f tof the universe” (TC,

11737).

22. Cf. Marcus Peter Ford,

Willinm Janres’s

Philosophy (Amherst :Universi ty

of

M assachusetts Press, 1982), 100: “This process view of the relations between God

and a given individual,

o r

God and the W orld , which both James and W hi tehead

ascribe to , necessariIy implies that God has an environ m ent and that Go d s in so me

respects imited n pow er and kno wled ge.

Both

James and W hitehead accept his

view o f

God,

bu t

for

different reasons. Whitehead’s understanding of God’s lirnita-

tions follows fro m metaphysical principles whereas James’s understandingof

God

(at

least as deve loped in A Plrrrnlislic Universe) is merely an

ad

hoc so lu t ion to theprob-

lem of evil.” I would strongly disagree with

Ford

on

this . Granted that James does

not present his case with the system atic m etaphy sicaligor of Whitehead, I th ink it is

clear that even in PU the metaphysical pluralism advanced by James eads to

a

finite

God. Even apartfrom the problem

of

evil, a n in f in i te God would seem to undermine

the au tonomy and f reedom

of

hum an ac tivity, crea tivity, an d novelty.

poor over-beliefs rnay not actually help God

in

tu rn to be m o re effectively fruitfuI to

his ow n greater tasks” (VRE, 08).

“I

confess that I do no t ee why thevery existence

of an invisible worldm a y not in partdepend on the personal response which any one

of us rnay mak e to the religious appeal”

WB,

5).

24.

Cf. Levinson, RIWJ,

205: “Jameswanted t o articulate

a

pantheism that

adrnit-

ted real

c h a o s on

the one hand bu t real

reparation

o f chaos on the o ther .”

25.

Joseph Heller puts thesewords i n t o t h e m o u t h f his pro tag on ist, Yossarian, in

Cutch-22 (N ew York: Dell, 1961), 184. Cf. Friedrich Nietzsche, Daybreak, trans.

R.

23. “Whoknowswhether he a i thfulnessof ndividualshere below to their o w n



270

Notes to Chapter

6

J. Hollingdale (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 52-53:

“God’s hon-

esty.-A

god w h o is all-knowing and all-powerful and w h o does not even make sure

that his creatures understan d his intention-could that be a go d

of

goodness? W ho

allows countless doubts and dubieties to persist, for thousands of years, as though

the salvation o f mank ind were unaffected by them , and w h o on the othe r hand holds

ou t the prospect o f frightful consequences if any m istake is m ade as to the nature of

truth? Would he n ot be a cruel god if he possessed the tru th a nd could behold man-

kind miserably tormenting itself over the truth?”

26. Bonnell Spencer,

0 H .

C.,

G o d

Who

Dares to Be M an : Th eol ogy for Prayer and

SuJering (New York: Seabury Press, 1980), 4. It is significant,

I

believe, as David

Griffith notes in his review of this work, that Spencer balks at positing a finite Go d.

Instead he justifies God’s actions o n t he basis of divine self-limitation and respect fo r

the integrity of human self-determination

(Process Stud ies,

Fall 1983, 238).

I

suspect

that this is an example of an unresolved conflict between an existential insight and a

desire to m aintain the traditional understanding of G od .

27. H. D. Lewis,

T h e S e l f an d Imm or ta li ty

(N ew Y ork: Seabury Press, 1973), 196.

28. Williamson,

Ha s Go d Rejected

His

People

150.

29. John K. Roth,

Process Studies,

Fall 1983, 236-37.

30. Cf.

Lem, “N on Serviam,” 316. “H e wh o is almighty could have provided

certainty. Since H e did no t provide it, if H e exists, H e mu st have deemed it unncess-

ary. W hy unnecessary? One begins to suspect that ma ybe H e is not almighty. A God

not a lmigh ty would be deserving

of

feelings akin t o pity, and ind eed t o love as well;

but this, I think , n on e of our Theodicies allow.” If Lem gives us a playful version o f

the situation, Th om as Ha rdy gives us a m ore cynical one:

He did sometimes think that he had been ill-used by fortune.

. . . But that he and

his had been sarcastically and piteously handled in having such irons thrust into

their souls he did not maintain long. It is usually so, except with the sternest of

men. Human beings, in their generous endeavor

to

construct a hypothesis that

shall not degrade a First Cause, have always hesitated to conceive a dominant

power of lower moral quality than their own; and, even while they sit down and

weep by the w aters of Babylon , invent excuses for the oppression which pro mpts

their tears. ( T h e Return of the Native [New York: Harper Row, n.d.1, 455)

“God” to me, is riot the only spiritual reality to believe in. Religion mearis primarily a

universe

of

spiritual relations surrounding t he earthly practical ones, not merely relations

zf

“value,” but agencies and their activities.

I

suppose the chief premise fo r my hospitality

towards the religious testimony of others is my convictiori that “normal” or “sane” con-

sciousness is

so

small a part

o

actual experience. Wha t e’er be true, it is not true exclusively ,

as a philistine scientijic opinion assumes. The other kinds ofconsciousness bear witness to a

much wider universe

of

experienccs,Jiom which

o u r

beliefselects and em phasizes such parts

as best satisfy our needs.

(LW’,

11213)

31. Cf. James’s reply to a questionnaire concerning his views of God and religion:

32, Ian Barbo ur, Myths, Models, arid Paradigms (N ew York: Ha rper Row, 1976),

161.

33. Cf. O w en Barfield, Savi ng the Appearances (N ew York: A Harvest/HBJ B ook,

H arc our t Brace World, n. d. , f.p. 1956), 160. Barfield contends that histo ry has no

significance “unless, in the course o f it, the relation between creature and C rea tor is

being changed.”

34.

God as a presupposition for personal immortality is, of course, the view of

almo st all w h o have in any way affirmed the latter doctrine. “A lm os t” bu t no t all-a




notable exception is the late nineteenth-cen tury Hegelian philosopher, J. M . E.

McTaggart; see his Humari Immortality and Pre-existence (London: E. Arnold, 1916).

35. Cf. also WB, 111: “In every being that is real there is som ething external to,

and sacred from, the grasp of every other. God’s being is sacred from ours. To co-

operate with his creation by the best and rightest response seems all he wants of us.

In such co-operation w ith his purposes, no t in any speculative conquest o f him , n ot

in any theoretic drinking of him up, must lie the real meaning of our destiny.”

Levinson expresses James’s view he re as follows: “W he n they [Theists] characterized

the world as ‘thou,’ they pictured its deepest power as formally personal, individu-

ated, and caring, fighting for righteousness as men understood it and recognizing

each individual for the person he is. God was a ‘power not ourselves’ who helped

people realize their best inten tions because he me ant t o” (RIW’, 41).

36. Cited by Ronald W. Clark,

Einstein: T h e Life arid

Times (New York: World,

1971), 19.

37. For a distinguished, if unheralded, expression of a relational personalism, see

the Gifford Lectures of Jo hn M acm urray, published in 2 vols., Sel f as Agent and

Persorzs

in

Relation (L on do n: Faber Faber, 1957, 1961).

38. Ralph Harper,

The

Existerrtiul Experience (Baltimore, Md.

:

Johns Hopkins

Unive rsity P ress, 1972), 122, 123. H ar pe r sees the threat, if no t the already realized

reality, of th e loss of transcenden ce and presence as placing t he very life of the self in

jeopardy. Thus he states: “Proust meant to be shocking when he said, ‘We exist

alone. M an is the creature that ca nno t em erge fr om himself, that know s his fellows

only in hims elc w hen he asserts the con trary he is lying’ (Rernernbrance

o

Thitigs Past,

2:698).” Ha rper maintains that- “n o m ore frightening jud gm en t has ever been ma de

of human existence, not even the announcement that God is dead, for it is tanta-

mount to saying that man is dead also” (p. 82).

39. John Dewey, Experience and Nature (N ew York: Dover, 1958), 244.

40. R. H. Charles, Eschatology (N ew York: Schocken Boo ks, 1963), 61.

41. Th e possibility of a contin ued existence apart fr om the bod y is acknowledged

by Whitehead: “ H ow far this soul finds

a

su pp ort for its existence beyond the bo dy

is:-another que stion. T h e everlasting nature o f G od , which in a sense is non-tem-

poral and in anoth er sense tem pora l, may establish w ith the soul

a

peculiarly inten se

relationship o f mutua l immanence. Th us in som e im por tant sense the existence of

the soul may be freed fro m its com plete dependence upon the bodily organization”

(Adverztures o Ideas [N ew York: Free Press/M acm illan, 19671, 208).

42. Luke 20:38.

C H A P T E R 7

1. Joseph Butler, T h e A n a l o gy o

Religion

(Lond on: H enry G . Bo hn, 1860, f.p.

1736), 328.

2. Cf. John H erm an Randall, Jr., Philosophy a je r Darwin , ed. Beth J. Singer (Ne w

York: Columbia University Press, 1977), 18 (hereafter P A D ) : “Science had already

destroyed th e faith in personal imm ortality .

I t

could o f course no t disprove the belief,

but it could and did make it seem irrelevant to the kind o f being m an

is.”

See also,

Louis Du pr i , Transcendent SelJhood (N ew York: Seabury Press, 1976),

80:

“Indeed,

even to religious believers today the thought of

a

future life remains far from the

center of their faith, if they do not reject it outright.”



272 Notes to Chnpter 7

3.

Hans Jonas, T h e

Phewonremn

ofl-ife ( N ew

York: Dell, 1966),262

(hereafter PL).

4.

Hans Kiing,

Eternnl

Life,

trans. Edward Q uinn (New York: Doubleday,

1984),

...

x111.

5.

Joseph Blenkinsopp, “Theological Synthesis

and

Hermeneutical Conclusions,”

in

Immortality and Resrsrrectior~,

ed. PierreBenoitandRoland Murphy (Herder

Herder,

1970),

115 (hereafter

IR) .

6 .

Schubert

M .

Ogden,

T h e Reality ofGod arzd O t h e r Essays

(New

York:

Harper

7.

William Ernest Hocking,

The Meurlirlg o fIm mo rfa lit y n Huntan Experiertce

(New

York:

Harper, 1957), xvii-xviii (hereafter

MI).

8. Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus

Logico-philosophicus,

trans.

D.

E. McGuinness

and

B . F. McGuinness (New York: Humanities Press,

1941).

151.

Cf.

also Wittgen-

stein’s

The

Blue and Brown Books

(New

York:

Harper Row,

1965),

45:

“The diai-

culty in philosophy is

o say

no m ore than

we

know.” Perhaps

at

least one benefit and

one

liabilitywouldresultfrom iteraladherence to this njunction: Th e benefit

would be that most of us, in particular philosophy professors, would be rendered

almost

mute; the liability might be that unless we continually strive

o

say

more

than

we know, we will

never

kttow more than we now say.

9. P e k e has expressed hisperhapsassuccinctly as anyone:“There

are

three

things we can never hope to attain

.

.

.

absolute certainty, absolute exactitude, abso-

lute uncertainty”

(The

Collected

Papers

of Charles Smders Peir te, 8 vols., ed. Charles

Hartshorne, Paul Weiss, and Arthur

W.

Burks [Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univer-

sity Press, 1931-35, 19581,

I , par. 141. The Kant text

is

found in the “Preface to the

Second Edition”

of

he

Critiqrre ofPtsre Reason,

trans.

Norman

Kemp Smith (London:

Macmillan, 1953),

29.

10.

Cf.

Ian Barbour,

M y t h s , Models, and

Paradigms (New

York:

Harper Row,

1976), 180 (hereafter M M P ) : “There is a ‘holy insecurity,’ as Buber calls it, in our

lack

of

certainty about the finality

of

our formuIations. There

is

a risk in acting

on

the basis

of

any interpretative framework which

is

not

subject

to

conclusive proof.

Faith, then, does not mean intellectual certainty

o r

the absence

of

doubt, but rather

a

trust and commitment even when there are

no

guaranteed beliefs or infallible dog-

mas. Faith takes us beyond a detached and speculative outlook into the sphere of

personal involvement.”

11. Cf. Reinhold Niebuhr,

T h e

Se l f a rd Its

Dramas

(N ew York: Scribner. 1955),94:

“T he elaboration

of

the meaning of he Christian revelation demanded from the very

beginning that the tru th about life and

God

apprehended in an historical revelation

be brought into conformity with the truth which may be known by analyzing the

structures and essences

of

reality on all levels.”

12.

Cf. RichardNeuhaus’sdescription of WolfhartPannenberg’s heology:

“ A

critical faith is not a compromise with modernity. It is, rather, a more radical com-

mitment which takes the risk

of

making

one’s

faith vulnerable to refutation by

fur-

ther evidence” (“H isto ry as Sacred

Drama,” Worldview,

April, 1979, p.

23).

The risk accompanying critical thinking is not restricted to Christians or even to

“religious” believers.

Cf.

John Dewey, Experience

attd

Nulure (New York:Dover,

1958),

222:

“Let us adm it the case of the conservative; if we once start thinking no

one can guarantee where we shall corne ou t, except that many objects, ends and

institutions are surely doom ed. Every thinker puts some portion

of

an apparently

stabIe world in peril and

no

one can wholly predict what

will

emerge

in

its place.”

ROW,

1966), 229-30.



Notes fo Chapter 7 273

13.Jonathan Swift,

GdIiver’S

Travels, ed. Robert A . Greenbcrg ( N e w

York:

Nor-

14.

In Bernard WiIliams, Problems ofthe S s [ f ( N e w York:Cam bridge Universi ty

15. Corliss Lamont , T h e Illttsiorl cflrnmovtality, i n t roduc t ion byJohn Dewey (New

16. The following tex t of Wittgenstein’s is, I believe, a response to a situation

ton ,

1970), 177ff.

Press,

19761,

82ff.

(hereafter

PS) .

York: Frederick Ungar,

1965),

13 (hereaftcr,

IT).

similar to the

one

under consideration:

There are, for instance , these entirely different ways

of

thinking first of

all-

which needn’t be expressed

by

one person

saying

one thing, another person

an-

other thing.

What we call believing

in

a Judgement Day or not believing in

a

Judgement

Day-the expression

of

belief may play

an

absolutely minor role.

If you ask me whether or not

I

betieve in a Judgem ent Day, in the sense n which

religious peop le have belief in it ,

I

wouldn’t

say: “No. I

don’t believe there will be

such a thing.” It

would

seem to be utterly crazy

to say

this.

And

then I give an exp lanation: “I don’t believe in . . .”, but then the religious

person nevcr believes what 1 describe.

1 can’t

say.

I can’t contradict thatperson. (Lertrrres nnd Conversations on Aesth~rics ,

Psychology and Religimrs

Belief,

ed.

Cyril

Barrett [Berkeley: University

of

California

Press, n.d.3, 55)

17,

W hile no t asserting that Paul Ricoe ur is adva ncing

a

position identical in

all

respects

to

the one here presented,

do

believe that his com m enta ry on the fol lowing

Goethe c i ta t ion points in the

ame

direction:

If you have not understood

The command,

“Die

and become ”

You are

but

an obscure transient

O n

a shadow of an earth.

“Highly coded language” says Ricoeur. “The incantat ion suggests that we dare no t

translate: The 110 and

ycs

are bound in all things according toa dialectic law which is

not

at all one

of

arithernetical composition but one

of

metamorphosis and transcen-

dence. T h e universe travails und er th e

hard

law of ‘Die and become’ ” (Freedom atld

Natu re , trans.Erazim V. K oh ik E va ns ton , 111.: N orth we ster nUniversi ty

Press,

1966 , 473).

18.

Andrew

Grecley,

Death

u r d Beyortd

(Ch icago : Thom as M ore Pre ss , 1976),

37.

19. Is this somcthing of what Nietzsche is calling for in the following? “ T h e

need-

I sacr$m.”These serious, excellent, upright, deeply sensitive people

who

are still

Christ ians from the very heart : theyowe i t t o themselves

to

try for oncc the experi-

ment

of

living

for some

length

of

t ime without Christ iani ty, they

we

it to theirfoith

in this way

for once to so journ ‘in th e wilderness’-if on ly to

win

for themselves the

right to a voice o n the quest ion whether Christ iani ty is necessary’’

( D a y b r e d ,

trans.

R. J.

Holl ingda le [New

York:

Cambridge Universi ty

Press,

19821,

37).

20.

O f course ,

I

am em ployin g paradoxical mo de , nonovelty in questions

of

this

sort. O n e m i g h t argue that in such questions as God and immortal i ty , anything

less

than paradox is trivial; an ything

more

is impossible.

21.

Julius Seelye Bixler, I r m o r fa l i t y and

the Presertt

(Cam bridge, M ass. : Harvard

University Press, 1931), 35 (hereafter IPW.

22.

Cf.

Miguel

de

U n a m u n o ,

T h e

Tragic

Sense

OfLfe,

trans.

J.

E.

Cr aw for d Flitch



274 Notes t o C h u p t e r

7

( N e w

York:

Dover,

1954)

(hereafter TSL) . U n a r n u n ono ton ly refuses to accept

im m orta lity belief and tragedy as mutually exclusive but goes a

long

way toward

making tragedy the essen tial character of such belief . Unam uno’s style is mu ch too

florid and superheated

to

suit the laid-back contempo rary ph ilosopher; nevertheless,

I

mu st admit that

I

find myself engaged

by

his metaphysical wail. Indeed, without

sugges t ing any compar i son be tween my ha l t ing ,ll to o tentative words and those of

U n a m u n o , m y

effort

might be ent i t led: “Unamuno without Tears.” I am s t rugg ling

to s ing

the

same song, t hough in a much lower key and wi th imm easurably more

prosaic music.

23.

Lael Wertenbaker,

Death

O J U Marl (Boston: Beacon

Press, 1974), 70.

24. For a strong cond crnn ation

of

belief in imm ortal i ty as unwo rthy of hum an

beings, cf. Leslie Dew art, “ T h e Fcar of Death and Its Basis in the Na tur e of

Con-

sciousness,”

in

Pltilosophical

Aspects

o j

Thmn olog):

2

vols.,

ed.

Florcnce

M.

Hetzler

and Austin H. Kutsche r (Ncw York: MS S In fo rma t ion C orpora tion ,

1978),

161,

63

(hereafter PAT): “ T h u s our comm on th ink ing today beg ins w i th the p remise tha t

immortaIity is desirable. .

. .

Critical reflection should reveaI n ot only its invalid ity

but also itsdisvalue

for

human development.

. . .

Man may

well

die,needlcssly,

from his self-imposed, mo rtal fear of death.”

25. Will iam Ernest Hocking and Ralph BartonPerry, bo th sym pat het ic to elief in

imm ortality, assert that such beIief does not rem ove thepain of death.

“No

doctrine

o f

survival

i n any case escapes the act of dea th ,” Ho ckingells us, “nor the suffering

that goes w ith it; these remain the data of every argument” ( M I , 9). According to

Perry, “ T h e belief in a futu re life mitigates but does not destroy the menacc of death,

and w hile it provides reserves of hope i t lcaves abundant room for fort i tude’’ (The

Hope oflrrrrtrortality [ N e w York:Vanguard Press, 194.51, 26; hereafter HFI).

26.

C f. Friedrich Nietzsche, Ec c e

Honro,

t rans. and ed. Walter Kaufmann

(New

York: Vin tage Books, 1969),261: “Ultimately, nobody can get

more

o u t of things,

including books, t h a n h ealready

knows.

For w ha t on e lacks access

to

from experi-

ence one willhave

no

ear. N o w let

us

imagine

an

ext rem e case: that a book speaks of

nothing but events that l ie a l together beyond the possibi l i ty of any frequent or rare

experience-that it is the first langu age for a new series of experiences. In that case,

simply nothing wil l be heard, .but thereill be the aco ustic il lusion that w here n oth-

ing is heard, noth ing is there .”

27. The

Antichrist, in

The

Portable

Nietzsche, trans. and ed.

Walter

Kaufmann

(New

Yotk: Viking Press, 1954), 618 (hereafter PN) .

28. Cf. Walter Kaufmann,

Nietzsche,

3rd ed . (New York: Vintage Books, 1968),

102: “To escape nihi l ism which seems involved both

in

asserting the existence of

God and thus robbing this

world

o f ultimate significance, and also in denying God

and thus robbing

evevythit lg

of

meaning and value-that

is

Nietzsche’s greatest an d

most persistent problem.”

29. Friedrich Nietzsche, The tVi l l

to

Power, trans. WaIter Kaufm ann and R. J. Hol-

lingdale,ed.Walter Kaufmann (N ew

York:

Vintage

Books,

1967), 17 (hereafter

W P )

30. C f .

WP,

3: “What I relate is the history of the next two centuries. I describe

what is coming, what can no longer

come

differently:

the

adveut oftlihilisrn.”

31. Tlms Spoke

Zarufht.rstvn,

in

PN,

125. See also theNietzscheno te cited by

G e o r g e M o r g a n , Nietzsche

Ncw

York:Harpe r

Torchbooks,

1965), 313:

“We

must

take

up on us and affirm

ulI

suffering that has been suffered, by

men

and animals,

and

huve a

g o d

in which it gets r e u m t .”



Notes

t o

Clrclpter-

7 275

“We

ust i fy all the dead subsequcntly and give their l ife me aning , when w e form

t h e su p e r m a n o u tof

this

material and give the entire past a g o a l . ” See also texts cited

by Karl Jaspers, Nietzsche, t rans . Char les F. Wallroff- and Frederick

J.

Schmitz (Chi-

cago:

Henry

Regnery,

1965), 167:

“In

spite

of

d l ,

he

must come

to

us

sometime, this

redeemitrg man .

. .

who gives the-ear th i t s purpose

.

. . this victor over God and

nothingness. . .

.

God has died, ‘our desire is now tha t the superman live.”

32. Cf. Joan Starnbaugh, Nietrsche’s Tholrght of Etcrt~alRvtcrnl (Ba l t imore , Md . :

Johns H opkins U nivers i tyPress, 1972),

88:

“ T h e su p e r m a n

s

the man who

is

able to

a f ir m eternal recurrence, the man w h o experiences eternal recurrence 2s h i s own

inner being. Th e su per m an is

a possibility which appears with the death o f God.”

33. For an insightful development of eternal return as the affirmation

of

the depth

of t he moment , see Stambaugh , N i c t r s c I ~ e ~ sh r g h t .

34.

I

think that

Bernd

M agnus is r igh t when

he

claims that Nietzsche does not

escape a version o f eternalism in his effort

o

overcome that kronoyhobia that appears

to be an inescapable feature

f

thc human condit ion; ee Magnus , Ni(’tzsche’sExisrerj-

rial

I tnpevdve (Bloom ington: Indiana Universi ty Press,

I978),

195-96.

35. Rainer Maria Rilkc, himself touched by N ietzsche, wrote

of

his own

Dtrino

Elegies and Sowlets

to

Orpherts:

“To

presuppose the omvtes5 of life an d death .

.

. to

know the identity of terror and bliss .

.

. is th e essential meaning and idea

of

my t w o

books” ( B r i e j , Wiesbaden,

1950,

11, 382,

407;

cited in Erich Heller, T h e Disinlterifed

Mind [ N e w York: Farrar, Straus Br Cudahy , 19571, 148).

36. John J . McDermot t , “The Amer ican Ang leof Vision,” Cross Currents, Winter

1965, p. 86.

37. Th es e essays have been collected in

John

J. M c D e r m o t t ,

The

Cdturc o fExpev i -

ence

( N e w Y ork: N e w York University Press,

1976;

hereafter

CE);

and Streams .f

Experience (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1986; hereafter SE).

38.

“Time

and Individuality,” in On Experience,

Na t u r e , and

Freedom, ed. Richard

Bernstein (N ew York: Library o f Liberal Arts, 1960),225.

39. See also S E , 98: “Yct this

was

preciseIy what American classical philosophical

tradition was proposing, namely that the very transient character

of

our

hu m an Iives

enhanced, rather than denigrated, the profoun d inferential character

of

our values,

decisions, and disabilities.”

40. N o r m a n 0 Brown, LifE

agnitrst

Death (New York: Ra n d o m House,

1959);

Lave’s

Body New York: Random House ,

1966);

Closing Tirm New York: Random

House,

1973).

41. Unpu blished note , c ited

by

Eric Heller, “ T h e I m p o r t a n c e of Nietzsche,” in

The

Artist’s Journey info the

Interior

(N ew York: H arcou rt Brace jovanovich, 1976),

193.

42.

That “all shall

be

well”

is,

of

cour se, the essence

of

eligious

hope.

T h e

fif-

teenth-century mystic jul ian of Norwich expresses this as

a

divine revelation: “At

One

t ime ourLord said: ‘All things

shall

be well’; and a t another she said: ‘Thou shall

see thyself that a l l m a n n e r of things

shall

be well’ ” ( 7 k e Rwelntions

qfDivir7e

Love

c$]diayl $Norwich, trans. James Walsh, S. j. [New

York:

Harper,

19611,

98).

43. Rajner M aria Rilke, “ T h e N i n t h Elegy,” in Dtrino Elegies, t rans. , with intro-

duction and commentary , J. B. Leishman and Stephen Spender (New York:Nor to l l ,

1939),

73,

44.

Charles Hartshorne,

“A

Philosophy

of

Death,” in

PAT, Ik83.

45.

Cf .

Yeager

Hudson , “Dea th and the M ean ing

of

Life,”

in

PAT,

II:98:

“A

play

o r novel which did no t end would

be

comp letely unsatisfactory.” Hartshorne and



276

Notes

t o

Chapter

7

Hudson might f ind suppor t for thc i r posi t ionn esthetic grou nds in the examples

of

“endless” soap operas. For many, however, the lack of a final endin g do es no t seem

to diminish the interest .

46.

Charles Hartshorne, “The Acceptance

of

Death,” in

PAT,

1234-86.

47. For a diametrical ly opposed view, see Ho cking ,

M I ,

150: “The t rue meaning

of the deed is wh at i t m eans to theclf which performs i t ; wi thout his self the deed

has no meaning

a t

all.

. .

. A nd if this self vanishes, and all like it, me aning vanishes

out of the wor ld .

No

achievement can keep the person alive, but the continuance o f

the person is

a

guaranty that such values as that shall n ot reduce to no thi ng . I t

is

the

person who perpetuates the achievement, not the achievcmcnt the person.”

48. A . N. Whitehead,

Process

arrd Reality (N ew York: Hum ani t ies Press, 1955), ix

(hereafter

PR) .

49.

A .

N.

Whitehead,

Sciwce

ar~d

he

M o d e m World

( N e w

York:Free

Press/Mac-

millan,1969), 192.

50. T h e

locus

classicrrs for this view of im m orta lity is in Pericles’ Funeral Or atio n,

Thucydides 2.43-44. An dy Warhol som ewh ere said someth ing to the effect that “ in

the future everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes.” This would hardly have

satisfied the Gre eks and is not l ikely to satisfy any present or future fam e seeke rs.

The

essence

of

belief in fam e-im mo rtality is that one will achieve or create somc-

thing that will: continu e to endu re after

one’s

death. The radical discrepancy between

the living experience and what remainss poignantly captured in the opening ines o f

James’s “Address at the Emerson Cen tenary in Conco rd” : “The pa thos of death is

this, that when thedays of one’s life are ended , those days that wereo crowded with

business and felt

so

heavy in their passing, what remains

of

o n e in m e m o r y

should

usually be so slight a t h i n g . T h e p h a n t o m

of

an attitude, the echo of a certa in mode

of thought , a

few

pages of pr in t , some invention, or some victory we gained in a

brief critical hour, are all that can s urvive the b est

of

us” ( M S , 19).

51. George Santayana, Life ofRenson,

5

vols. (N e w York: Scribner, 1913),

I11:272.

52. I t must be conceded that James comes verylose to agreeing with the view that

survival

of

values

or

ideals

is

more important than survival

of

individuals. In

V R E ,

he

tells us that he did no t discuss imm ortality because it see m ed to him a secondary

point. . . . I f o u r ideals are only cared for in ‘eternity,’ I d o n o t s ee w h y w e m i g h t

no t be willing to resign their care o other hands than ours” V R E , 412). In a letter to

James, C arl Stumpf, after declaring that “personal imm ortality stands for m e

in

the

foreground,’’ c i tes he foregoing passage and comm ents hat it “seems to me to

contain a sortof inner contradiction. T h e realization of ideals is only possible

on

the

presupposition

of

individual immortality.” James responds:

I

agree that

a

God ofthe

totality must be an unacceptablc re l igious object. But do no tsee why there m ay n ot

be superhuman consciousness

of ideals

of

ours, and

thnt

would be

o u r

G o d .

I t

is

all

very dark. I have never felt the rut iord

need of

inuno rta l i ty as you seem to eel i t ; but

as I g r o w older I confess that I feel the practical need of it m u c h more than I ever did

before; and that comb ines with reasons, not exactIy the sam e as your own, to give

me

a

gro wi ng faith in its reality” (cited in Raip b Ba rton Perry, The Tlrolcghr urd

Character

ofWill iam]ames,

2

vols. [Boston: Little, Brown, 19351, II:343,

345).

James

here converges with and diverges from the iews of Hartshorne and Jonas. He con-

verges insofar as he makes survival

of

ideals the important matter; he diverges inso-

far

as

he

does

not exclude the possibility of personal survival,

53.

John Hick ,

Death

and

Eternal Life

(New

York: Harper

Row,

1976),

73,

63-64




(hereafter

D E L) .

See also R.

H.

Char les , Eschatology ( N ew York: Schocken Books,

54. ThomasAquinas , Srrm~nnTheologim, I , Q. 29, Art. 3 , t rans.Anton Pegis

( N e w

York:

Rand om Hou se , 1945) ,

1:295.

55. For

an apparentcounterchoice,seeMaryMcCarthy’snovel, C y n i b u l s

u r d

Missiorraries ( N e w

York:

Harcourt Brace jovanovich, 1979), 293-94. A grou p o f h i-

jackers are in process f exchanging hostages

for

som e g rea t works o f a r t . O ne

f

the

hostages, sym pathetically portrayed, reflects upon the “stragetic genius” of this un-

dertaking: “If a hostage or t w o g o t killed, it had to be seen in the perspective

of

the

greater good of the greater number. But works of art were a different typeof non-

combatant , not

to

be touched wi th

a

ten-foot pole by any government respectful of

‘values.’ I t was in the nature of civilians to die soo ner or a ter

.

. . while works of a r t

by their nature and in principle were imperishable, In addition, they were irreplacea-

ble, which could no t be said o f their owners . . .

.

T h e lesson to be derived

.

. . was

that paintings were m o re sacrosanct than persons.”

1963), 51-81.

56. Romans

9:20-21.

57. Perh aps th e m ost laid-back response

to

“ the absurd” is that of Thomas Nage l

in “Th e Ab surd ,” in

Larprage ,

Metuphysi ls , and

Death ,

e d . o h n D o n n c l i y ( N e w

York: Fordham University Press, 1978), 114:

“I

would a rgue tha t absurd ity s on e of

the

most hum an th ings about us . .

.

. I t need not

be

a matter of agony unless we

make it so. Nor need i t evoke a def ian t contempt ofate that allows us to feel brave or

proud. Suc h dram atics, even if carried on

in

private, betray a failure to appreciate the

cosmic impor tance of the situation.

tf,

sub specie aetenlitalis, there is no reason to

believe that anything matters, then that does not matter either, andwe can approach

our absurd l ives with i rony instead of heroism or despair.”

58. Cf.

Gabriel Marcel, The Mystery ofBeing, 2

vols.,

trans. G. S. Fraser (Chicago:

H en ry Regnery, 1950-51), 11:155: “W hat we have t o find o u t is whether one can

radicallyseparate aith n a God conceived n His sanct i tyf romanyanlrmation

which bears on the destin y of the intersubjective unity which is form ed by being s

wh o love one ano the r and whoive in and by one another . Whats really im po rtan t,

in fact, is the de stin y of the l iving

ink,

and not thatof an entity which is isolated and

closed in

on

i tsel f. Th a t i s what we more

o r

less explicitly m ean when

we

assert our

faith in personal immortality.”

59. Even bracketing the quest ionof God, the cessation of human persons must be

lamented. “I t is absu rd for

us

to insist ,” Bixler points out , “ in

line

with the present

mood, OR an educational process n which personality shall be developed and an

economic order n which it can be maintained, and o profess a t the sam e ime

indifference t o its extinction” (IF“, 35).Cf. Perry, HFI, 11: “Whatever philosophy

praises the creation

of

man must deplore his annihi la t ion.”

60. Cf. William Styron’s novel. Sophie’s ChoiLe ( N e w York: Ra n d o mHouse ,

1979),218-19.Styron’s protag onist, viden tly peak ing for the uthor, rgues

against George Steiner’s sugg estion that confr onted with an

vil on

t he magn i tudeof

the Holocaust, “s i l tme is the answer”; he adds that “Steiner has not remained si lent”

bu t has stated that “the next best

is

‘ to t ry and understand.’

I

61.

Cf.

ZPM,

63, where B ixler cites the British idealist Bernard B osanquet

to

the

effect that

“we

shall never get

a

popular conception of religion that is clear and sane

until rhis perpetual hankering after a future life as a means of recompense is laid to

rest.”



278

Notes to Chapter 8

62. For an interpretation of resurrection that does not separate individual and com-

munity, cf. Charles,

Eschnrology,

164: “ N o t to a utureof nd ivid ual bliss, even

tho ug h in the divine presence, but to

a

resurrect ion to a new life

(is.

xxvi.

19)

as

mem bers of the holy people and ci t izens of the Messianic kingdom , did the right-

eous

aspire.

T h e id iv idr ra l thus looked forward to his highcst consummation in the

life

of the r ighteous comm unity” ( i ta l ics added). For a more recent perso nalist ver-

sion of resurrect ion,

cf.

Rosemary Haugh ton , The

Pussiomte

God (New York: Paulist

Press, 1981), 196: ‘yesus talked t o people about eternal life, o r l ife in the kingdom

of

God, in ways which m ake

i t

clear that

he

t hough t of th em as being still and always

‘themselves.’ They would not ‘merge’ into the kingdom, theywould ‘inherit’ it, live

in it, have ‘mansions’ in it.”

63. Cf. Hans Kiing, Dm5 G o d

Exist?

t rans. Edw ard Q u i m (New York: Double-

day,

1980),

659:

“Th ere can be

a

t rue consummat ion and

a

t rue happiness of mankind

only wh en n ot m erely th e last generation , but all m en, even those who suffered and

bled in the past , come to share in i t .”

64.

I

a m n o t ,

of

course, suggesting that this

cotzstancy

of belief in eternal life has

been an

i d e t r t i f y of

belief in all ages of h e Ch r i s t i a n c o m m u n i t y . T h eifferent modcs

in which hisbeliefhasbeenexpressed hroughart, iterature,reliquaries, altar-

pieces, death rites, and funerary practices

is

brilliantly detailed by Ph ilippe Aries in

The

H o w

OfOw Death, trans. Helen Weaver (N e w York:Knopf , 1981).

65. Cf. James B. Pratt , The Religious Consciuustress (New

York:

Macmillan, 1928),

253: “As the belief in miracles

and

special answers to prayerand in the interference o f

the supernatural within the natural

has gradually disappeared, almost the only

mg -

mafic

value of the supernatural left to religion is the belief in a personal future life”

(cited in La m on t,

11

6). See also Lam ont,

11 5:

“But in this fundam ental identi ty

between

God

and immortal i ty priori ty stil l belongs to imm ortal i ty . God wou ld be

dead

if

there were no immorta l i ty .”

CHAPTER 8

1 .

j o h n

Hick,

Death

a d

E f e r r d

LIfi

(Ne w York: Harper

81

Row,

1976),

24

(here-

after D E L ) .

2. H. D. Lewis, T h e

S e l J o r d Zmnrorlaliry

(N ew York: Seabury Press , 1973), 196

(hereafter

S I ) . See

also William Ernest

Hocking, T h e

1Mentlit lg qf I t w m t d i r y itt

HI JWU I ~Jxperience (New

York:

Harper,

1957),

xi-xii (hereafter hdl): “ U d e s sm Idea

has or car1 have an

inrelligibk

basis irr the cotzsritdotl 0Jthitlg.s i t is i l legitimate, w hether

for postulate

or

for fai th : we mus t be ab le tosay what

i t

is we postulate

or

believe.”

3. Cf. David L . Nor ton ,

Personal Destinies

(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University

Press, 1976), 358: “He w ho a f firms the wor th of l ife does not embrace the dea of

a n

afterlife that is the ant ithe sis

of

the life he and all human beings live.”

4. John Dewey, Experience

u r d

Edumtion (N ew York: Macmil lan , 1956), 51.

5.

Alber t Camus, The Rebel, t r ans . An thony Bow er (New York: Vintage Books,

1956), 304.

6 . Chris topher Mooney, “Dea th

and

Human Expectat ion,” in Philosophicnl Aspects

~JThanntu logy, vols., ed. Florence

M .

Hetzler and Austin

H.

Kutscher ( N e w York:

MSS Information Corporat ion, 1978), II:f51 (hereafter PA7).

7. For a suggestion of

some

convergences as well as divergences between prag-

mat ism and the thought of Au robin do, see Eugene Fontinel l , “A Pragmatic

Ap-

proach

to

The

HWJOU

ycle,”

in

Six

Pillnrs,

ed.Robert

A .

M c D e r m o t t ( Ch a m -

bersbutg,

Pa.:

Wilson Books, 1974),

131-59,



Notes to Chapter 8

279

8. Such a view is antithetical to any interpretation of le s us ’ teaching that sees n o

comparison possible betw een prese nt and future lifc. For a representative example,

see Franz Mussner , “The Synopt ic Account ofJesus’ Teaching

n

the Future Life,” i n

Immarraliry

u r d

Rcswrecfiotz,

ed.PierreBenoi tandRolandMurphy Herder

8:

Herder,

1970), 53: “ I t

is Jesus ’ teaching that the cornin g life bears no cornparison

with the present life. To make Jesus a witness to a poin t of v icw tha t saw th is l i fes

one. evolving towards the coming life, wo uld be to nlisrep resen t the syno ptic ac-

cou nt of his teaching.’’

9. Cf. Denis Goule t ,

“Is

Economic Just ice Possible?”

Cross

Currents,

Spring 1981,

47: “C an any re ligionoffer a convinc ing ra t ionale why m en and wom en should

build history even as they strive to bear witn ess to transce nden ce? . . . One vitaj

arena is how any religion values tim e itself: is ea rth ly life sim pl y a means to some

paradise beyond his world,

o r

is it rather

some

end having ts

own

dignity and

wor th?”

10. Cf.

James,

S P P , 116: “ ‘ I f w e d o

ur

best, a d he other powersd o heir best , the

worldwillbeperfected’-this propositionexpresses n o actual fact, but only he

complexion of a fact tho ug ht of

as

eventually’possible.’’

11.

For

a critique

of

Tei lhard de Chardin on jus t th is poin t , see , George Maloney,

“Death and O meg a: An Ev olving Eschaton ,” in PAT, I:143: “ T h u s tw o great wcak-

nesses of Teilhard’s syst em (he never co m es to serious grips with the problems) are

(I)

he fa ils to continue the evolut ionary proces s beyon d the O mega Point and 2) he

does not answer how the major i ty of the hu m an race, all those billions w h o have

lived in the past , our present majori ty and a good deal of the fu tu re to come, how

will

they reach the Omega Point?”

12. Cf. Aldous H uxley,

Thc

Doors

ofPerceptiorz

( N e w York:

Harper

81 Row, 1963).

23-24:

“Tha t w h ich , in the language of religion, is called ‘this world ’

is

the universe

of reduced awareness, expressed, and, as it were, petrified by language. Th e various

‘other worlds,’ with which hum an beings erratically make contact are so m any ele-

ments in the totality of the awareness belonging to Mind

a t

Large.”

13.

See

also

W B ,

51:

“But the inner need

of

believing that this world

of

nature is

a

sign of something more spir i tual and erernal than i tse lf

is

jus t as strong and au-

thoritative

i n

those who feel i t , as the inner need

of

uniform laws

of

causation ever

can be in

a

professionally scientific head.”

14.

Though he wou ld be outraged by the use James and I m a k e

of

it, a somewha t

similar phenom enon is suggested

by

Nietzsche: “We discover an activity that would

have to be ascribed to a far higher and more comprehensive inte l lect than we know

of.

. .

.

Of the numerous influences operat ingat every m om en t, e,g ., air, electricity,

we sense almost

nothing: there could well

be

forces that, although we never sense

them, continually influence

us”

( T h e

Will

to

Power,

trans. Walter

Kaufrnann

and

R.

J .

HoIlingdale , ed. W alter Kaufmann [N e w York: Vintage

Books,

19671, 357).

15. T he re is a highly technical question attached to the notion of a plurality of

worlds: namely, the possibility

or

conceivability

of

plural times, o r plural spaces,

or

plural space-times. Speculation on this question is not confined to “tender-minded”

o r “roman tic” thinkers. See, for examp le, Hocking ’s reference MI,

10)

to “Min-

kowski’s M em oir of 1908,

in

which he vigorously assaulted the doctr ine f m o n i sm

(though chiefly

for

the purposes of calculation), mak ing the radical assertion that

‘from

henceforth we shall speak no m or e

of

Space and Tim e, bu t of spaces and

times.’”

John Hick

( D E L ,

279-95) speculates on the plurality of spaces as a prerequisite for



280 Notes to Chapter 8

a doctrine of bodily resurrect ion. The dist inguished psychologist Gardner Murphy

asks, “Is the re a possibility that general psyc holog y wou ld say, ‘We don’t yet have a

time-space reference for th e stu dy of death any more than we have a t ime-space

reference for the study of pe rsonali ty?’

”

(T he Menning

of

Death ,

ed. Herman Feifel

[ N e w

York:

McGraw-Hill , 19651,

339).

The conceivability

of

plural spaces is defende d by An thon y Qu inton in “Spaces

and Times,” Philosophy, April

1962.

And work ing f rom a radically differen t philo-

sophical and cultural context, P. T. Raju states: “ I think that the Upanishads are r ight

in saying that there are different levels f space and time .

There

is space between one

book and another; but what

s

th e space that separates ideasof cause and effect when

think o f the law of causation? W hat

is

th e space that separates m e and

m y

mental

images? Certainly, I am not m y mental images . And w hat is the time that separates

me as

observing the first instant o f

a

duration

of

f ive seconds and m e as observ ing

the last i n s t an t? How man y p rob iem srise

here?

(“Self and Body: H o w K n o w n a n d

Differentiated,” Monis t 61,

no.

1 Dan. 19781,

153-54).

16. Cf. John Shea , What a Modertr Cntholic BeIieves about Heaver1

a t ~ d

ell (Chicago:

T h o m a s M o r e Press, 1972),

21

(hereafter

H H ) :

“H op e is rooted in the actual i ty

of

things. . . . If personal immortality is a t rue hope and nota mere wish, in som e way

it must be intimated in the experienceof men.”

17.

Extrapolation is an act o f imagination that should be sharply differentiated

from

idle fantasy.

Cf.

WilIiam L ynch,

S .

J.,

Images qfHope

(N ew York : New Am er i -

can Library, 1965),

27, 209:

“Fbr o n e of the permanent meanings of imagination has

been that it is the gift that envisions what cannot yet be seen , the gift that con stantly

proposes to itself that the boundaries of the possible are wider than they seem.

. .

.

Th ej vs t task ofsuch atr imqin ntio n,

; f i t is

to be healing,

is

to-finda

~ u a y

hvotrghfantnsy arid

lies into fact

u r d

ex i s te~ce .”Lynch also develops this them e, that the imagination is

essentially reality-oriented, in Christ urd Apol lo ( N e w York: Sheed Ward,

1961).

18.

Recall the previously cited statement ofjarnes: “I have no mystical experience

of

my

own,

bu t ju s t enough f t h e g e r mof mystic ism in me to recognize the region

from which their [sic] voice comes when

I

hear it” (cited in Ralp h Ba rton Perry,

T h e

Thought and Character

o

WilliamJames, 2 vols, [Boston: Lit t le , Brown, 19351, II:346;

hereafter TC).

I

have made no reference to a large body of claims which are often cited as sup-

port ing imm ortal i ty-those of spir i tual ism and other paranorm al psychic experi-

ences. T h e evaluation

of

these claims is an undertaking in itself and one that I make

no

pretense o f doing in

a

footnote . Let me

simply

say that

I

share with many who

have sym pathetically investigated these claims the conclusion, “no t proved.” That is

not heirgreatestweakness,however,

for

pragmatismneither asks norexpects

“pro of’ in such nstances . What

i t does

seek

are

fruits in the

form

of

the deepening,

illumination, and expansionof hu m an life. S uch fruits can reasonably

be

said to issue

fro m the ives of m an y f no t al l myst ics but are decidedlyless evident in thecase of

“spiritualists,” particularly in their c laims of comm unica tion wi th the dead . Jam es ,

himself deeply sympathetic with and professionally supportive

of

such efforts, con-

cluded, as we

saw

earlier, that “the spirit-hypothesis exhibits

a

vacancy, triviality and

incoherence

of

mind painful

to

think

of

as the state o f the departed”

(CER,

438-39).

A figure w h o m i g h t b e an exception here, and who com mand s the respect o f a

num ber of serious thinkers, s Rudolph Steiner. While I

find

the details of

his

other-

world descript ions bordering o n th e fantastic, there is an e lement

of

nsight in his

wri t ings that

I

think should not be dismissed. Tw o passages from his autob iograp hy



Notes

to Chapter

8

281

m igh t be cited as most congenial t o the kind o f extrapolation or mo del herein of-

fered:

“‘I

have tried t o sh o w n

my

book that nothing

utrknowdde

lies behind the sense-

world,but hat w i t h i n i t is the spiritual world. . .

.

i insisted hat a pe rson who

deepens his view

of

the world

as

m u c h

as

l ies within the

scope

of

his powers, will

discover

a universal process

which

encom passes the true reality of nature as well as

morality”

(Rtrdolph Steirter,

An Autobiography [Blauvclt,

N , Y.

: Rudolph Steiner Pub-

lications,

19771,

215, 213). T he re

is

one o the r g roup o f phenom ena tha t

I

can only

mention in passing-‘“clinical death” expe riences such as those described by R. A .

Moody in Life

n j e r

Life (St . Simons Island, Ga.: Mock ingbird Books, 1975). These

are instances in w hich persons judged clinically dead, ‘“return” o life and proceed to

describe “out of body” experiences, usually as beautiful and reassuring. While these

exper iences mig ht supp or t a v iew of theelf that avoids identifying it withthe body

narrowly understood,

I

f ind no thin g in them that

can be

cited as evidence for im-

mortality. Since the d efinition of “death” presupposed is suspect, there is no

d i 6 -

culty naccounting or hesephenomena in“materialistic” erms. 1 shareHans

Kiing’s conclusion concerning such cases: “What then d o these experiences of dy ing

imply for life after death? To put it briefly, noth ing .

.

.

Experiences of this

kind

prove nothing about a possible life after death: it is a question here of the last five

minutes bejore death and not of an eternal life u j e r death” (Eternal Life?, trans. Ed-

w a r d Q u i n n [ N e w

York:

Doubleday, 19841, 20).

19. Cf. Gottfricd

Leibniz,

Discourse on M e t a p h y s i c s , t r ans . George R. Montgomery

(La Salle, I l l : O pe n C ou r t , 1947). 58: “Suppose that

some

individual could suddenly

become King of China

o n

condi t ion ,

however,

of forget t ing what he had been, as

though being born again, would t n o t a m o u n t to the samepractically,

or

as far as the

effects could be perceived, as if the individual were annihilated, and a king of China

were the same instant created in his place? T h e individual would have n o reason t o

desire this.” A similar insight is found

in

Aristotle:

“No

o n e c h o o se s t opossess the

whole wo rld if

he

has f irst to beco me som eone else . . * he wishes for this only

o n

conditionofbeingwhateverhe is”

(Nichonracheurr

Ethics 9.4.1166a, ed. Richard

McKeon

[New

York:

Random House , 19411,

1081).

20.

BernardWilliams, Problems of the Self ( N e w York: Cambridge Univers i ty

Press, 1976), 91 ( hereafter P S ) .

21. Fried rich Nietz sche, Thus

Spoke

Z a r d r l u t r a , in The Porkd.de Nietrrche, trans.

and ed. Walter Ka ufm ann New

York:

Viking Press,

1968), 339-40.

22.

Friedrich

D .

E. Schleiermacher, On Rdigion, t rans. by John

Oman

( N e w York:

Harper To rchbooks. 1958), 101.

Cf. A .

Seth Pringle-Pattison, The Zdea of

Immortality

(Oxford:

Cla rendon Press, 1922), 136,

155-56:

But eternity and immortality are by

n o

means necessarily exclusive terms : o n the

contrary, our experience here and now may carry in it “the power of an endless

life”, and be in truth

the

only earnest or guarantee

of

such a life.

.

. .

I t

does not

follow

that the attainment of religious insight in the present life involves the

sur-

render

of

any hope

of a

personal life beyond. W hy should not the app rehensionof

the eternal rather carry with i t the gift of further

life

and a fuller fruition? . .

.

Th roug hou t the Ne w Testament, accordingly, even

in

the passages which most

de ar ly treat “eternal life” as realized here

and now,

he present experience

is

never

taken

as

foreclosing the possibility of future

life,

but always ratheras a foretaste,

as an assurance, indeed,

of a

fuller realization hereafter.

23.

Soren

Kierkegaard,

Purify

of

Hear t ,

trans.Douglas

V.

Steere

New

York:

Harper T orchbooks, 1956), 35. Cf. J. H e y w o o d Thomas, ‘“Kierkegaard‘s View of



282

Notes

to Chapter 8

Time,” in PAT, 1233: “The point Kierkegaard wants tomake is that the eternal is the

present o r better that the present is the etcrnal.”

24.

George Santayana, S o l d o p i e s

IrI

Er1&zrtd

(Ann A rbor : Univers ity of M ichigan

Prcss,

1967),

1

16.

25. See also

M I ,

71: “ Bu t if lastingness isa

mark

o f value, is i t no t an absu rd i ty o fa

universe in which the everlast ing things are things which do no t know and cannot

become aware of their post of hon or?” For a diametrically opposed interprctation of

the endurance of inorganic entities, see Hans Jonas , Thc P h e m t n e t m

o f *

Life ( N e w

York: Dell, 1966),

276:

“If permanen ce were the point, l ife sho uld not have started

ou t in the first place, for in

no

possible form can it match the duration of inorganic

bod ie s.” Th oug h C am us doe s n o t clieve in its reality, he does recog nize theefficacy

of a life th at endu res: “I t appears that great minds are som etimes less horrificd by

suffering than

by

the fact that i t do es no t en du rc. In default

of

inexhaustible hap-

piness, eternal suffering would at least give us

a

destiny”

(TheRebel,

t rans . Anthony

Bo wer [Ne w York: Vintage B o o k s ,

19561, 261).

26.

Henri Bergson, Creative

Etdl4t io t1 ,

t rans. Ar thur Mitche l l (New York: M odern

Library, 1944), 7.

27. StewartSutherland, Imm ortal i ty ndResurrect ion,” in L n r p a g e , Meta-

physics,

alrd

De a tk , ed. Jo h n D o n n e l l y ( N e wYork: Fordham University Press, 1978),

206.

28. John Sm i th , “Dying ,

Death

and Their Significance,”

in

P A T ,

I x i i .

29. John B aillie, Ami the

L

Evev las t iq (N ew York : Oxfo rd Un ive rs i ty

Press,

1934), 204. Cited in Louis Dupri, Trmsrerlderlt Se l f l ~ ood , N ew York: Seabury Press,

1976), 81. Cf. O w c n Barfield, “Matter, Imagination, and Spirit,”Jonnzal o j R e l i g i w ,

Dec.

1974,

627:

“I would wish

to

emphasize hat I mean impor tan t

.

. . for he

whole fu turc of humani ty . The issuc of survival after death today has, I believe. that

kind

of

imp ortan ce as well as the p ersonal o ne. B ut I am not very fond

of

the word

‘survival’ in this context.t

has

too s t rong a suggest ion of a mere pro longa t ion of the

life we a re so familiar with. I prefer ‘im mo rtality’ as suggesting transition to a new

and very different kind

of

life.”

30. E.

J.

For tmann , Everlnstirtg

Life <Fer

Death (N ew York: Alba House, 1976),

301

(hereafter E L D ) .

31.

William Frost,“Religious magination,” Ecumerrist, March-Apri l 1980, 44.

Also relevant is Frost’s description (p. 43) o f the interpretation that the M arxist Ernst

Bloch givcs

to

“Christ’s saying that hew h o loses his ife will find

i t

and he w ho seeks

his

life will lose it. O nl y tho se who are willing to follow the life of the soul w hich

vibrates beyond the body and the mundane are mad e free

for

an immortal i ty which

is mo re than the existing form of reality. I t is the trans-cosmo logical.’’

32.

This ,

I

believe, is the fund am ental thrus t o fhis

The

PImtornettorl

q f M m ,

trans.

Bernard Wall (N ew York: Harper, 1959). Teilhard also implies that human beings

wou ld not participate in a

process

that they knew was a dead-end

one:

“M an wi l l

never rake a step in a direct ion he know s to be blocked. T he re lies precisely the ill

that causes o u r disquiet’’ (p. 229). See also p.

231:

“Witltorrt the

taste-for

lue, mankind

wou ld soon stop inventing and construct ing for a work i t knew to be doo m ed in

advance.”

33. Cf. Gabriel Marcel,

The

Mystery ofBPiug, 2 vols. , trans. G. S. Fraser (Chicago:

Henry R egnery, 1950,

1951),

II:157-58 (hereafter M B ) : “What we loosely call ‘be-

yond’ consists

af

unknown dimensions

o r

perspectives within

a

universe

of

which



we apprehend only the

one

aspect which is in tune with our ow n orga no-p sych ic

structure.’’

34. F. X . 13urrwel1, The Resurrcctiou (N ew York: Sheed Ward , 19601, 126.

35.

Piet Schoonenbe rg ,

“I

Believe in Eternal Life,” in The Probletr1 o fEs ~h u tu 1 1 ? ~y ,

ed. Edward Schillebeeckx,

0

P., and B oniface W illcms,

0

P. (N ew York: Paulist

Press,

1969),

110.

36. Ignacc

Lepp,

Denth

a d Its

MyrteriPZ, t r ans . Be rna rd M urch land (New York:

Macmillan, 1968), 188.

37, See also, Fortman,

E L D , 135,

where he describes K arl Rahner’s and Ladislaus

BoroGs process views o f purgatory. W hile Fortman himself is not comp letely antag-

onistic to a processive purgatory or heaven, he balks a t the notion of a processive

G o d .

38.

Henri B ergson,

Tuto

Sources

d R e l i g i o t t and

Morality ,

trans.

R.

Ashley Audra

and Cloudesley Brcre ton (New York: H c n r y H o l t , 1935), 124.

39. j.P. Ecke rmann , Gesprmche rnit C oe t he (Stu t tgar t : Co t ta , n .d . ) , c i ted in Rose

Pfeffer, Nietzsche, Disciple

of Diorlyslls

(Lewisburg,

Pa.

: Buck nell University Press,

1972), 267.

40.

See a lso N or to n , Persorlal Destirlies,

237:

“Go ethe said to Eckerm ann that he

would not know what todo with an afterlife if t did not provide new tasks and new

opportunities. This extrapolative propensity is supported by certain distinctive theo-

ries of imn lorta l i ty as exemp lif ied in the thought of

I n ~ m a n u e l

Kant and Josiah

Royce.

”

41. Ralph Barton Perry, The Ho p e f o r Inlrtmrality ( N e w York: Vangu ard Press,

1945),

8,

24.

42. I t should be noted, how ever, that the relation between “fitness” and immor-

tality was n ot a late-Iifc af ter th ou gh t fo r James. See

PP,

I:330: “The demand fo r

immorta l i ty is nowad ays essentially teleological. We bclieve ou rse lve s imm orta l

be-

cause we believe ourselves-fit

for

immortality. A ‘substance’ ou gh t surely

to

perish,

we think, i f not worthy to surv ive ; and

an

insubstantial

‘stream’

to prolong itself

provided it be worthy, if the nature of Things is organ ized in the rationa l way in

which

we

trus t it is.”

43.

Cf.

James

L.

Muyskens ,

The

Strjicierlcy

OfHope

(Philadelphia: Temple Univer-

sity Press, 1979), 72: “Unless one’s sense o f self and one’s potential are very limitcd

or one is un com m on ly blessed with favorable condit ions and knows i t , death blocks

one’s path to genu ine fulfillm ent. . .

.

A t th e tim e of one’s death, self-fulfil lment

nornlally has not been attained. Much of one’s potential remains untapped. lf, then ,

death is the

final

curtain, i t destroys the possibility of a truly mean ingful Iife to a

great many. For them , it wo uld be reason able to desire a life after death in the form

of personal survival.”

44.Cf. Marcel, MB, I: 153-55: “First I k t m e q u o t e again what one of m y charac-

ters says, ‘to love a being is t o

say,

“T h o u , thou shal t not die.”

’

. . .

[This]

prophetic

assurance . . . m igh t be expressed fa ir ly enough

as

follows: whatever changes may

intervene in what I see before

me,

you and I will persist as one: the event that has

occurred and which belongs to the order of accident, cannot nullify the promise of

eternity wh ich is enclosed in our love, in ou r m utu al pledge.’’

45.

Thomas Hardy ,

Tess

ojrhe D’Urbervi l les (N ew York: Signe t, 1964),

416.

Prince

Andrew in Tolstoy’s

f i r

atrd Peoce responds differently to the separation consequent

upon

the death

of

a

loved

one:

“All

I

say

is

that

it

is no t arg um ent that convinces

me



284

Notes to Chapter 8

of

the necessity of a future life, but this: when you go hand in hand wi th someone

and all a t once that person vanishes here,

into

tzoulhere, and you yourself are left facing

that abyss and look in, And have looked in .

.

.” ( t rans . Aylmer Maude [New

York:

Simon

gL

Schuster,

19421,

422).

46.

GabrielMarcel Creative Fidelity, t rans.Rober tRostha l New York: Farrar,

Straus Giroux, 1964), 152. For a fine cxposition

of

M arcel’s views on death, see

Barbara E. Wall , “The Doctrine of Death in the Philosophy of Gabriel M arcel,” in

PAT,

II:223-35. For a description

of

a “phenomenon” s imi lar to Marcel’s but in-

terpretedradicallydifferently,seeVivienneThaulWechter,

“ A

T im e to Live-A

Time to D ie?” inPAT,

11244-45:

“As an addendum m ust be added, tha t

though

my

own understanding-or wish-for death as ‘the end,’ has

I

suspect seeped thr ou gh ,

theremustbeanadmissionof heambivalencewh ich is acommonafliction.

T h o u g h

I

choose to th ink ,

to

intellectualize, to indeed wish for that kind

of

death as

in the words of Epicurus ‘when dea th is come we are not’-neverthcless

I

find my-

self relating

to

loved on es w ho have died as tho ug h they have migrated into sum e

kind of discarnate existence, which still is in som e m ys ter io us way related to

me

here. A nd m y drcanls indicate that I wish to encourage this relationship.”

47. See, e.g ., Karl Jaspers,

“On

M y Philosophy,” trans. F. Kaufrnann, in Exirterr-

t iu l isnrjom Dosruevsky t o

Sur t re ,

ed. W alter Kaufnlann ( N ew

York:

Meridian Books,

1968), 147:

“Th e individ ual cann ot becam e hum an by himself. Self-being is on ly

real n com mu nication with anoth er self-being. Alone, I sink into

gloomy

isola-

t ion-only in com m un ity wi th oth ers can

I

be revealed in the act

of

mutual discov-

ery.” For an impressive and intellectually demanding exposition and evaluation of

both transcendental and dialogical versions o f a transactional social self, see Michael

Theunissen, The Other: Studies in

the

Social Ontology ofhlwsserl, Heidegqer, Sartre a d

Buber, t rans. Christopher Macann (Cam bridge, Mass.: MiT Press,

1984).

Far a subtle and unset t l ing suggest ionof the way in which man-made mass death

impacts upon the social o r transactional self, cf. Edith W ysch ogro d,

Spirit

i n Arhes:

Hegel, H e id e a e r ,

artd

Man-Made Muss Death (N ew Haven, C on n. : Yale Universi ty

Press,

1985),

21

1:

“The concept ion

of

a linguistic and co rporeal transactional

self

holds in equipoise the individuating aspect f self, the I pole, and the objectified me.

With the advent of man-made mass death this more

or less

ha rmonious un i ty is

broken: the I pole is shattered resulting in a negative and apocalyptic s ubject. Each I

experiences the possibility not only of its own co m ing to an end but a lso of h u m a n

extinction in toto as a result of human acts.”

48. Josiah Royce’s ideal of the “Beloved C om m un ity,” developed in The Prob/em of

Christianity

1913;

Chicago: Universi ty

of

ChicagoPress,

1968)

wouldbe

a

rich

resource for an extrapolation along the lines of the one I am sugges t ing. One text

will

indicate the direction of Royce’s efforts:

Th e ideal Christian comm unity is to

be

the community ofall mankind,-as

com-

pletely united in its inner

life

as one conscious self

could

conceivably become, and

as destructive of the natural hostilities and of the narrow passions which estrange

individual men, as i t is skillful in winning from the infinitc realm of bare pos-

sibilities conc rete arts of contro l over nature and ofjoy in its own riches of grace.

This free and faithful community of

all

mankind, wherein

the

individuals should

indccd die to their own natural life,

but

should also enjoy

a

newness

of

positive

life,“this com m unity never became, so far as I can learn,

a

conscious ideal for

early Buddhism. (p. 195)



Notes to Concludirlg

Rt$ections

285

49. T h e metaphysical character of “struggle” is suggestedby James: “The facts o f

struggle seem

too

deeply characteristic of the whole frame o f things

for me

n o t t o

suspect that hindrance and experiment go

a11

the way through ” TC,I:379).

50 Cf. A n n e C a r r , “ T h e

God

W h o Is Involved,” Theology Today, (Oc t . 1981,

314:

“There is today theological insistence, rooted in interpretations of the Bib le and of

contemp orary experience, that the

God of

Christian faith, while remaining God,

is

intimate

to

the joy and the pain, the victory and the defeat, the struggle of human

existence, and comes to be kn ow n precisely there.” See also David Tracy, Blcssed

Ragejbr

Order

(N ew York: Seabury Press , 1975), 177: “Is no t the God

of

theJewish

and Ch ristian scriptures a G od pro fou nd ly involved in humanity’s struggle to the

poin t wh ere Go d not me rely ffects but is affected by the struggle?”

51.

“For i t is not against human enemies that we have to struggle, but against the

Sovereignties and the

Powers

w h o originate the darkness in this world, the spir i tual

a rmy of

evil

in the heavens” (Ephesians

6:12).

52. Cf Hans K iing, Does God

Exist?,

t r ans . Edward Q u inn (New York: Double-

day, 1980), 665:

“ T h e

biblical God is nota G od without feeling, ncupable cdstrgiring,

apathetic

i n

rtgard to the vast nrferingo tht. world and man, but a sym-pathetic com-passion-

ate

God.”

See

also,

Tracy, Blessed Rage,

177:

“Is Bonhoeffer’s famous cry that only a

suffering God can help rnereIy a rhetorical flourish of a t roubled m an? Can the G o d

of Jesus C hrist really be sirnply changeless, om nipotent, omn iscient, unaffected by

our angu i sh and

o u r achievements?”

53.

Eugen e Fontinell ,

“John

Hick’s ‘A fter-Life’:

A

Cr i t ic a l Co m m e n t , ” Cross

Cur-

r e m , Fall 1978.

54. See Hick, “Universal Salvation,” in DEL, 2428:

CONCLUDING R E F L E C T I O N S

1. For

a brief description of and the relevant sources relating

to

“ T h e O r i g in s

of

After-Life and Im mo rtality Beliefs,” see john Hick , Death and E t e r r d

Lifp

( N e w

York:

Harpe r

Br

Row,

1976), 54-77.

2. The Epic

of Gilgamesh it, the Ancierlt

Neur

Ens t , ed. James B. Prichard (Princeton,

N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1958).

I:64.

3.

Ecclesiastes 5:17, 9:lO.

4. Samuel Beckett , Wuitirlg&r Godot (N ew York: Grove

Press,

1954),

57.

5.

M arilyn French,

T h e

Women’s

Roorn

(New York : Summi t Books, 1977), 279.

6 . SigmundFreud, Beyord the Pleusure Principle, trans. anded. James Strachey

(New York:N o r t o n , 1961),

32.

7. Cf. V R E , 263: “We can never ho pe

for

clean-cut scholastic results. .

. .

Decide

that

orl

the

whole

one type

of

religion is

approved

by

its fruits,

and

another type

condemned. ‘ O n the

whole’-I

fear we shall never escape com plicity with that qual-

ification, so dear to

your

practical man, so repugnant to your ystematizer ”

8. Jeanne Hersch, “Jasper’s Conception of Tradition,” in T h e

Philosophy o

Karl

Jaspers, ed. Paul A . Schilpp (New York: Tudor , 1957),

603-4. Of

course, Mersch is

not sugg esting-n or am I-that

it

is either possible o r desirable to re tu rn to an

earlier mode of religion, whatever the richness of l ife that ensued fr om it.

9. C f. Gabrief Marcel, The Mystery

$Being,

2

vols.,

trans. G .

S.

Fraser

Chicago:

Henry Regnery,

1950,

1951),

II:146:

“The re

is

n o d o u b t but that the appalling er ro r



of which a certa in sort of spiritualism is guilty, l ics in deny ing to d eath this gravity ,

this a t

all

events apporettt final value, wh ich gives to hum an life

a

quality

of

tragedy

without which i t is no th ing m ore than a puppet-show.

There

is a mistake which

balances this one; i t is even more serious and mu ch weighter with consequences ; i t s

that which lies

in

a dogmatic affirmation of the final character of death.”

10. Cf. N o r m a n M a l c o l m , Llrdwi‘p W i t t p s t e i t r : A Merrloir (London : Oxford Uni-

versity Press, 1958),

71:

“W ittgenste in once suggested that a ay in w hich the notion

of imm ortal i ty can acquire meaning is thro ug h one’s feeling that on e has duties from

which one cannot be released, even by death.”

I

I .

See James’s letter to Perry in Ralph Barton Perry,

The Thought u r d

Character

o

WiIliarrl

James, 2

vols. (Boston: Lit t le , Brow n, 1935), II:475: “Cer ta in ly a doct r ine

that encouraged immortal i ty would draw belief mo re than one that didn’t , f it were

exactly

as sntis4ctovy

in residual respects, Of

coursc

it could n’t prevail against kno ck-

knock-down evidence to the contrary ; but wh ere there is n o such evidence, i t will

incline belief. ’

12. Ecclesiastes

9:3.

Cf. Max Horkhe imer , D i e Seknsrrrht rrach

dern g u m

Arzderen,

an in te rv iew wi th commenta ry by

H.

G u r n n i o r ( H a m b u r g ,1970), 61-62; cited in H.

Kiing, Does G od E x i s t , t rans. Edw ard

Q u i n n

(N ew York: Doubleday , 1980),

491:

“Theo logy .

.

is the hope that this injustice which characterizes the world is not

permanen t, that injustice will not be the last word

.

.

.

that the murderer will not

tr iumph over his innocent vic t im.”

13.

For

a similar version

of

th is a rgument ,

see

James

L.

Muyskens ,

T h e

S t r _ B i c i e r q

ofHope (Philadelphia: Tcmple University

Press,

1979), 74-75.

14.

Cf.

T he Brothers K U ~ W J ~ Z O Vy Dostoevsky and The

P I a p e

b y Ca m u s for an

example

of

two person s perceiving with great insight , intensi ty , and sensi t ivi ty the

irreducible absurdi tyof the sufferings of innocent children b ut rcspo nding with dif-

ferent modes of hope .

15.

Cf. A . N. Whitehead, Adverttures of ldeas ( N e w York: Free Press/Macrnillan,

1967), 286:

“Decay,Transi t ion, Loss, Displacementbelon g o he essence of the

Creative Advance.’’

16. Glenn Cun ningham , the great miler , through persistent effort , overcam e se-

vere leg

burns

suffered as

a

youth .

17.

Cf. the reflections

o f

Hans Jonas ,

who,

th ou gh unable t o accept personal im-

mortality, nevertheless desired that the victims of Au schw itz achievc so m e m od e

of

imm orta l i ty through be ing a spur to an e f for t tha t wi l l t ransform huma n

life.

T h e

refusal to forget them serves as the

way

in which they

are

incorporated in the living

process.

18.

Som e years ago, I concluded an essay

on

“Faith and Metaphysics” with the

following:

The Christian of today, unlike his believing forerunners, will no longer expect o r

seek supe rficial aid or com fort from the Othe r. not cven the certain assurance of

His existence. it might be suggested that a distinct advantage of such an approach

would be the avoidance of the ch aracteristically Christianmode of self-deception,

i.e., the affknation of the nob lest values as a blind

for

a spiritual egotism, for a

selfish

individual obsession with personal immo rtality which the contemporary

world

has

quite properly designated as unw orthy of ma n. Th is ast will jar Chris-

tians, but if

we

were to

put

i t simply

we

might ask which

is

the more

noble,

a man

who loves his fellowman in order to avoid hell-fire

or

one wh o loves him because

he is his fellow-man. T his

is

by

no means

a

radically new insight,

for

it is already



contained 111

thc

stor y of the saint wh o encountered an angel walking down the

road

with a torch i n on e hand and

a

pail

of

water in the other. When asked what

they were

for

he replied, “ T h e torch is

to

burn down

the castles

of heaven and the

water to put out the flames

of hell

and then

we

shall see who really

loves

God.”

(Cross

Cwre l z t s ,

Winter

1966,

39-40>

19. Som ething along these ines seems to

be

suggested in the le t ter Peirce wr ote to

James’s son onlam cs’s dcath :I think we have

afirll

l o g i d r(ght to en te r ta in h igh opes

of

a future lifc, a life of wo rk , long

r

perhaps endless. But i t

s

clear to m e hat i t has

not been intended

(so

to speak) that we should C o m f

upott

i t too implicitly” (cited in

Thomas K n igh t , Chnrles S m d e r s Peirce [ N e w

York:

W ashington Square Press, 19651,

23).

20. T h e priori ty of life over meaning is expressed in the fol lowing exchange in

Dostoevsky’s

Brother5

Karatnarou:

“ I

understand too well, Ivan. O ne longs to

love

with

onc’s

inside, with one’s

stomach.

You

said that so well and I am awfully glad that you have such a longing

for l ife,” cried Alyosha. “ I think everyone should love lifc above everything in the

world.”

“Love life more

than

the meaning

of

it?’’

“Certainly, love it regardless of logic a5 you say, it must

bc

regardless of logic,

and it’s only then one

will

understand the meaning of it. I have thought

so a

long

time. Half your work

s

done, Ivan, you love

life,

now you’ve o n l y to try to do he

second half and you are saved.”

“You

are trying

to

save

me,

but perhaps

I

am not lost And what does

your

second

haIf mean?”

“Why, one has to raise up your dead, who perhaps have

not

dicd

after

all.”

(trans. Constance Garnett [New York:

Modern

Library, n.d.1, 239)

I t

is this passage that

Camus

probably had in mind wh en he remarked:

“One

m u s t

love life before loving its m eanin g, says Do stoev sky. . . .

Yes

and w h e n t h e love of

life disappea rs, n o me aning can console us*’ Notebooks

1949,

cited

in

Germa ine Brke,

Conrrrs [New Brunswick , N.J.: Rutgcrs Un iversity Press, 19591,

57).

21.

No on e has xpressed this charge m o re passionately nd ividlyhan

Nietzsche. See

The

Birth

.f

Tragedy,

t rans. W alter Kau fm ann, (Ne w

York:

Vintage

.Books, 1967),

23:

“Christ iani ty was from the beginning, essentia l ly and fundam en-

tally, life’s nausea an d di sg us t w ith life, mere ly conccakd beh ind , masked by, and

dressed up as, faith

in

‘another’ o r ‘better’ life.’’

22.

F o r

a

similar call from

one

located

at

t h e o t h e r po le o f the d ia logue ,ee Michael

Harr ington , The Politics at God’s Frtrleral New York:

Holt,

Rinehart 8= Winston ,

1983), 197, 202: “C an W estern-Society create transcendental

common

values in its

everyday experiencc?

Values which

arc not based upon-yet not coun terpos ed to-

the supernatural?

.

.

. M y ans w er is clear by now: there is no wayback-or for-

ward-to

a

re ligious integrat ion of socie ty on the m od el

of

Judco-Christ iani ty in

any of ts manifestations. B ut the re is a need for the transcendental. That is why the

conflict between religious and athcistic humanism must now bc ended.”



Index

Absolute, the,

91 107

43, 150,

207

262 n.

15;

and evil, 216; ames’s critique

of, 144-48

Action, in Barbour,

259

n.32

Activity: and action, 97; haracter of, in

Amphitryon 38, 173-74

Aquinas,St.Thornas,I90,252n.21,277n.54

Arendt, Hannah,

183

Aries, Philippe,

278n.64

Aristotle,

3, 281

n.19

Associationism, 86, 90-91

Atom istic individualism, xiii, 11, 17 27

Aurobindo, Sri , 203

Ayer, A . J., 35,

242 n.23

“Bad faith,” 48, 167, 175, 216. See also

Badhe,John, 09 282 .29

Barbour, Ian, 20, 154,

236

nn. 13-14,

Barfield,

Owen , 270n.33, 282 11.29

Beckett, Samuel, 222,

285

n . 4

Belief, 166, 172 177 223 238.26,

fields, 42

46,

157

Self-deception

238

n.31, 259

n.32 270 n.32 272

.10

263

n.25; and arguments, 232; in fame-

immortality,

276

n.50; in

God,

xi, 101,

134-35 137-3841, 152

156,

174

179-80 190, 197 200

26,

231

257n.58; in higher presences, 148; n

human annihilation, 173; and immor-

tality,

286

n.

1

I ; ofjames,

113;

and

needs, 270

n.31;

n

other worlds, 206;

psychological dimen sion

of,

268

n. t

1

;

religious,

214 17866

n.3,

268

n.15;

and resurrection, 195-97; n the resur-

rection,

167;

and

risk,

232;

and self-de-

ception,

223-24;

n superhuman life,

206; Wittgenstein on , 273 n.16

Belief in personal immortality, xi-xiv, 8

202 204 20510, 232;Bixler on, 194;

and Christianity,

196-98;

nd compen-

sation, 228-29; nd consolation,

224.

229; and its counterbelief,

189-90;

nd

death, 174, 274

nn.24,

25;

s demean-

ing, 229-30;Dewey

on,

172, 182; Dos-

toevsky on, 22;

s

energizing

or

deenergizing,

171-72 231;

s ex-

pression of expectancy, 130; ading of,

222; and field-self, 132; fruitfulness o f,

182 225-26;

nd

God,

101,

132 133.

156,

158, 159;

and a growing

worId,

99;

hope or hindrance, 199; and illusion,

173; and James’scritique

of

the Abso-

lute,

144;

nd justice,

227;

n Marcel,

277 11-58; McDerrnott on, 179-80, 184;

and meaning,

230;

nd metaphysical

dualism, 168; and model of the self, 45;

and a moral universe,

226-27;

nd

“new life,”

200;

Nietzsche’s critiquc of,

177-79;

nd personal identity, 81; and

pragmatic evaluation, 15, 19 232;s

“reasonable,” 169-70; nd science,

271

n.2; Smith

on,209;

nd tragedy,

173-75

274 n.22; and Western religion,

194; nd wider consciousness,

11

5

289



290 Irzdex

Bellah, Robert, 266 11 3

Bcntley, Arthur

F., 31,

241 n.

13,

245

11.3

Bergson. Henri. 27, 33, 41, 62. 102. 112.

Berkcley, Geo rge, 34

Bernstein, Richard, 144.

235

11.3,

Bixler, Julius Seclye, 172, 192, 194,

Blenkinsopp, Joseph,

165,

195-97,

Bloch, Ernst, 282

n.31

Bode, B. H . , 106

Body,

the, 7, 48, 69-80; am biguity

of,

88;

in Bloch, 282 n.31; and con sciousn ess,

78; in Dewey, 248 n.21;

in

Eastern

thoug ht, 70; eucharistic, 195; field. 78-

79; in H usscrl,

254

n.35; in fames, 6 6 ,

69, 74, 77-78, 93, 253 nn .29 , 31; in

Lepp, 254 n.40; “lived body ,” 70-71,

75-76, 78-79, 253 11.22, 57 n. 14; in

Marcel, 71-73, 254 n.36; in Merleau-

Ponty, 71, 76; in St . Paul,

252

n.21; and

personal identity,

88;

in physics,

254 n.39; and rcsurrcction, 195; in

Sartre, 71, 73, 254 n.36; and the self, 7,

80, 102, 122, 254 n.4, 255 n.41; in

Whitehead, 30, 274 n.41; and the

world, 78

203, 209, 213, 282 n.26 , 283 n.38

240

nn.11,

14;

238 n.17, 275 11.38

273 11.31, 277 1111.59,

61

272 n . 5

Bonhoeffer, Dietrich , 285 n. 52

Boros, Ladislaus, 283 n.37

Bosanquet, Bern ard , 277 11-61

Boscovich, Ruggiero, 239

n.2

Bradley, F. H.,7

Braudel, Fernand, 52

Brie,

Germaine, 287 n.20

Brown, Norman O., 182-83, 275 11.40

Buber, Martin,

183,

272 n.10

Burhoe, Ralph Wendell, 245 n . 3

Butler, Joseph, 165, 271 n.1

Camus.

Albert,

183.

201,

227,

278

n.5,

ca ne z, Maurice, 252

n .21

Capek, Karel, 170

Cap ek, Milic, 92, 249 n.

1 ,

258 nn . 16, 21,

Carr, Anne,

284

11.50

Centers

of

activity, 14, 30, 96, 103, 127,

Charles, R. H.,

59,

271 n.40, 277 n.53,

282 n.25, 286 n.14, 287 n.20

23;

260 11.2

154,187,213

278

n.62

Chisholm . Roderick, 8, 252 n.19, 256 17.4

Christ , 209-10, 213, 282 11.31,285 11.52

Christianity, 4. 167. 196-98, 287 11.21

Clement

of

Alexandria, 4

Concrete,

the

(Concreteness),

27,

28,

33,

Consciousness, 32, 69, 88,90, 96, 97,

37, 40-41 , 62, 79,

107,

1 1 1

153,

203,

231, 265 n.39, 270 n.31; and

body, 78; critical, and faith, 168; Dewcy

on,

56, 58; field(s) of, 58, 61, 63, 76-

122, 153, 243 n.30, 255 n.43 , 261 n.8,

263 n.2 1; greater reservoir of, 264 n.34,

267

n .7 ;

in Jam es, 34, 36, 67. 74, 92,

102-3, 111, 249 11.34, 253 nn.27, 29;

258 nn.24, 25; 262 n.14; many w orlds

of, 227, 206. 212; of mystics, 129; and

personal identity, 86, 256 11.5, 262 n.

18;

praycrful,

268 n. 14; as processive-rela-

tional function, 94; production theory

of,

116; and pure experience, 38-39; of

self, 93, 250 11.3;self-compounding of,

77, 106-7, 109-11, 122; stream

of,

41,

49, 65, 69, 79 , 102, 130,

240

n.3,

251 n.

15,

357 n.9; and “stream of

scioluness,” 68; sublim inal, 363 n.21,

264 n.33,

265

n.42; superhuman, 132,

153, 156; transm ission theory

of,

116,

127; wider,

42,

105, 112-13,

115-22,

125,131,148,154

260

nn.6,7;

262 nn.15,18; 266 11.45; in

Dewey, 55;

of

fields, 26-30, 46, 76,

105, 204; and personal identity, 83-84,

86, 256 nn.3,5; between present life and

new life, 207-12; and substance, 129,

266 n.45; with super hum an conscious-

ness,

116, 124

78,

96, 98,102-3,106,

111,

118-19,

Continuity, xiii, 25, 43, 85, 91, 105,

Contributionism, in Hartshorne, 186

Cosm ic consciousness, 126-27, 265 n.43

“Cosmic omnibus”:

in

James, 108

Co sm ic (creative) process, xiii, 19-20,

159-60, 187,

203,

216,

229,

231

;

model of, 200, 202-4, 207-8; an d per-

sons, 21,

191

Cunningham, Glenn, 286

n.

16

Davidson, Thom as, 269 n.21

Death, 160-61,165-66,169-70,174,177,

284 n.46; Hart sh orne o n, 185-86; and

imm ortaiity belief, 274 n.25;

215, 221-22, 224, 227, 276 n.SO,



Kierkegaard on , 208; and love, 193,

214-15; Marcel o n , 247 n.13, 285 n.9;

McDermott on, 180, 182-83; meaning

of,

193; M urph y

o n ,

280

n.15;

Muyskcns

on,

283 11.43; and nature, 21,

147; and new life, 202, 21 1, 213; and

“out of body” cxperiences, 281 n. 18;

pathos of, 276 n.50; and resurrection,

105-97;

Rilke

on , 275 n.35 ; Whitehead

011,

188

Dvurlz find Beyond, 172

“Death

of

G od ,” 1 74, 177-78, 266

1 1 . 1 ,

Democritus, 51

Dennett, Daniel C., 46 n.9

Descartes, Rend,

15,

70, 258-59 n.3 6

Dewart, Leslie, 274 11.24

Dcwey, John,

8,

27,

80, 93.

157, 158, 183,

235 n.3, 236 n.16, 237 nn.17,20;

240 nn.9-12, 241 nn.13,16-19; 245 n.3 ,

247 n.14, 249 nn.25,26; 249 n.l,

251

n.

15, 259 n.29, 271 n.39, 272 n. 12,

278 n.4 ;

on

belief in immortality, 172,

182; o n dua lism, 50-51; events in, 54-

55,

248 nn.17-18; experience i n , 11-13,

32, 99. 337 11.22,242 n.19; on mate-

rialism , 51-56. 247

n . 1 5 ;

metaphysics

of,

30-31, 54-59, 248 11.15; mind-body

in, 248 n.21; and panactivism, 30, 96;

and pragmatic evaluation, 15-17,

251 11.12; on present-future dialectic,

201; relational view of mind and matter

in, 53-59;

on

religious experience, 171,

179-80; “situation” in, 30-31; time in,

182

275 11.32

Diary ofa

Wrifcr,22

Dilthey, Wilhelm, 27

Dilw orth, Dav id, 257 n . 12

Dooley,

Patrick Kiaran, 264 n.36

Dostocvsky, F yodor, 21-23, 239 n . 4 0 ,

Dualism, 8 ,

33,

39, 65, 151, 204,

286 11.14, 287 n.2 0

243 t1.28, 245

n.5 ,

246 11.9; and the

body, 70, 75; Dewey

on,

50-51; and

field-self, xiii, 48, 79-80: in James, 60,

242 11.34, 245

n.6 ,

255 n .2; and immor-

tality, 7-8, 127; ontolog ical (me ta-

physical), 11, 32, 37, 40, 43, 47-48, 50,

65, 96, 115, 143, 168. 247 n.15; prag-

matic objections to, 48-51

282

11.29

65, 74-75, 78, 82, 84, 104, 106 ,

1

14-15,

DuprC, Louis, 19, 238 n.27, 271 n.2,

Ecclcsiastcs, 221-22, 227, 285 n.3 ,

Eckermann, j.P., 13, 283 n11.39-40

Edie, James

M.,

98,

249

n . i

,

250 n.4,

286 n. 12

251 n. 1 I , 254 n.38, 256 n.3,

257 nn.13,14; 259 11-31

scendental, 85, 87, 91. See also Pure

Ehman, R obert R., 4, 68-69, 73-75, 78,

251

n n .

11, 17 , 18, 256 11.3

Einstein, Albert, 157

Emerson, Ralph

Waldo,

150

Environmcnt:

in

Dewey,

31-32, 57,

Ego, the, 5,

44, 60; transactiona l,

94;

tran-

Ego

241 n.16, 245 n . 3 ; of G od , 149, 152; in

M cDe rmo tt, 180; in Whitehead, 30

Epicu rus, 193, 284 n.46

Essnys

in

Rddical

Empiricism,

34, 60, 84,

Eternal, th e, 143, 168, 189, 208,

281 nn.22.23

Eternal life, 209, 217, 236 n. 12, 281 n.22.

See nlso Belief in personal im mo rtality;

Resurrcction

275

nn.32,33

101-2,106, 115

Eternal recurrence, 177-79, 201,

Evans, C. Stephen, 266 n.

1

Events, in Dewey, 54-58, 248 nn . 17-18

Evil,

150-51, 153, 193, 216. 227, 269

11.22

Evolutionary proccss, 186-87, 193, 203,

205,

216,

279 n.11; and new life, 210-12

Experience, 12 , 27-28, 40, 62, 79, 84

103-5,107-11,

115,

150,206,234

nn.32,

33,

256

n.8, 257 n.8 ; arnbigu-

ity

of,

36-37, 108, 134, 243 n.2 8; and

concepts, 38, 62, 107-8, 110; in Dcwey,

12,

32, 237

n.22;

and extrapolation, 84,

206-7, 238 n.33; and fields, 26, 29,

104-6, 112, 243 n.25; and God, 134-

37, 140, 237

11.26;of

idcntity, 249 n.3,

256 n.5; injames, 13, 14,

17, 36,

77,

79,

83, 91, 258 n.21, 260

n.6;

mystical,

265 n.30; personal, 11, 13-1 4, 19, 99,

102; and pragm atic evaluation, 15, 19-

20,

169; in pragmatism , 11-12;

re-

ligious,

121,

123-24, 139, 143, 147,

24, 230, 268 n. 11;

stream of, 65,

77-79,

88, 90-91, 94, 96, 102, 257 n.9;

a s

transaction, 12, 1 4, 16, 31-32, 235 n.4;

in

Whitehead, 13, 29. See

n l s o

Feel-

ing(s); Pure experience; Reality

112-13, 116-17,

119,

135-36, 156, 207,

150, 155, 157,179-80, 183, 198, 223-



292

ltrdex

Experience a d N n h u e , 54

External relations, 147-48

Extrapolation,

10, 32,

42, 124, 134, 203,

206, 210, 224-25, 229, 238 nn.30 , 33,

33,

280 n.

17;

and experience, 84, 136,

155; of personal im m orta lity, 73, 130,

n.30; pragmatic, 19-20,169

206-7;

of

God, 103, 112-13,

119,

134,

143, 202, 210-13, 215-16, 231, 238

Faith, 10, 53, 114, 167, 184, 212, 231,

236

nn.

12,13; 278 n.2 ; Christian, 167,

173, 245

n.5,

273 n.19 , 285 11.50; an d

conso lation, 229; critical, 168,

272

nn. 10,12; and illusion, 229; and

pragm atism, 167-69, 176,

222;

and rea-

son, 4, 6, 15; religious,

139,

156, 194,

197-98; and rcsurrection, 195-97; and

salvation, 175-76; supcrnaturalistic.

112, 114; and sym bols, 266

n .2 .

See also

Belief; Belief in personal immortality

Fechner, Gustave, 125, 127, 265 n.38

Feehg s), 80,

95,

98,

102, 250

11.6, 250-

51 n.lO, 251 11.18, 261 n.7;

of

causal

efficacy,

97-98,

259

11.35; in

James, 62-

64, 74, 104, 250 nr1.6,8-9; in Marcel,

72; and personal identity, 82-86,

256 n.4; and religion, 13, 260 11.5;of

“som ething mo re,” 67-68, 102; in

Whitehead, 63,

259

n.26

Feurbach, Ludwig, 268 n.11

Field(s), 31, 57, 111, 127,

132,

155,

241 n.18, 243

n.30,

259 n.35;

and

body,

69, 76, 78; characteristics

of,

29-30; as

constituting reality (world), 128, 153;

divinc, 137, 142, 154-55; “ficIds within

fields,” 27, 30, 46-47, 57, 61, 76-77,

127, 202; in James, 26-27,

93,

105,

120;

metaphor, 25, 29, 45, 76, 79, 96,

240 11.2, 253

11.32;

model, 64, 89, 107,

122, 137, 261 n . 11; and substance, 27;

theory in physics, 239 n.2.

See

also

Consciousness,

field s)

of;

Experience,

and fields

Field metaphysics, xiii; in Dewey.

54-59;

in James, 25, 33, 39, 76, 82,

84,

95, 128,

260 n. 1 , 265 n.43; and materialism, 51-

53; in Whitehead, 241 n. 18

Field-self, 45, 47-48. 93, 95, 102, 130-31,

155, 252 n .19, 265 n.37;

and

the divine

field, 154; in Jam es, 68, 92, 122-23; and

materialism, 51-53; and personal im-

mortality, xiii; as su bstantive self, 128

Flower, El izabe th, 17, 36, 237 11.23,

Fontinell, Eugene, 238 n.29, 278 11.7,

Ford, M arcus Peter, 244 n.36,

Fortmann,

E.

J., 209, 245 n.5, 252 n.21,

Freedom , 98-99, 114-15, 153-54, 217;

French, Marilyn, 285 n.5

Freud, Sigmund, 128, 180, 207, 222-24,

Frost, William,

209-10,

282

n.32

Galifeo, 4

Gard ner, M art in , 239 11.36

Geach, Peter, 8

Gilgamesh, 221-22

Giraudoux, Jean, 173

Godel, Kurt, 236

11.15

Go ethc, Johann Wolfgang von,

213,

267,

273 n.17, 283 n.40

Goulet, Denis, 279

n .8

Greeley, Andrew, 172, 273 n. 1

Griffin, David, 270 11.26

Gurwitsch, Aron,

257

n11.9,14

Hardy, T ho m as , 214, 270 n.30, 283 11.45

Harp er, Ralph, 22, 44, 158, 237 n .19.

239 n.42, 244 n.

1,

271

11.38

Harr ing ton ,

Michael,

287 n.22

Hartmann, Edward von,

268

n.

11

Hartshorne, Charles, 185-89, 190, 191-

92,

265

n.39, 272 n,9, 275

nn.44,45;

276 nn. 46,52

241 11.19,243 n.26, 260 n.6

285 n.53

261 nn.10,13; 269 n.22

282 n.30, 283 n.37

and God, 142, 152. 269 n.22

263 11.21, 285 n.6

Ha ughto n, Rosemary, 278

n .62

Hegel, Georg, 27, 191

Heidegger, Martin, 8, 27, 33, 243 n.29

HcH, xi, 217

Hcller, Erich, 275

nn.35,41

Heller, Josep h, 269 11.25

Hersh, Jeanne,

258

n.8

Hesse, Mary, 239

11.2

Hick, Jo hn, 190-91, 200,

237

11.19,

239 n. 34, 263 n.22, 276 n.53, 278 n. 1 ,

279 n. 15,

285

nn.54,l ; on human suf-

fering, 191; on univcrsal salvation, 217

Hocking, William Ernest. 166. 208, 213,

254 n .37, 272 n . 7 , 274

n .

25, 276 n.47,

278 n.2, 279 n.15; meaning in, 201

Hodgson,

S. H . ,

251

n . 1 8

Hofstadter, Douglas R. , 246 n.9 , 254 n.39



Irrdex 293

Hope, 166, 195-96, 199, 202, 209, 221,

275 n.42;

in

McDermott, 184-85; in

Nietzsche, 178

Horkheimer, Max, 286 n.12

Hud so n, Yeager, 275-76 n.45

Human Ittrmorrality, 11 1, 11

5,

120, 127

Human

Nature

and

Conduct , 58

Hume, David, 11, 81, 90-91, 167,

249 n.2, 251 n.19,

258

11.20

Husserl, Edmund,

15,

27, 33, 78,

243 n.29, 254 nn.35,36; 257 n.14,

258 n.19

HuxIey, Aldous, 279 n. 12

Huxley,

T.

H., 263 11.23

Idealism, 33,

51,

56, 70, 136, 140, 144,

266 n.44; and evil, 151; and p ure expe-

rience, 39

Identity, 46, 95, 210-11, 256 nn.3,5 ,

258

R.

9, 262 n. 18; logic

of,

107,

261 nn. 10, 13. See also Personal identity

Individual, the, xiii, 4-5,

8,

19, 44,

I

19,

157, 217; ann ihilation

of,

215;

i n

Blenkinsopp, 195; destiny of, 196; in

Fechner,

125;

and

fieIds,

132, 154-55;

relationship to God, 156; in Harts horn e,

185-86; and im m orta lity (resurrection),

6, 21, 190 , 195, 278 11.62; in jaspers,

284 n.47; in Jonas, 187; and pragm atic

evaluation, 17-18; and religion, 157,

159, 269 n. 15.

See

also Person; Soul

Internal relations, 147

Jaspers, Karl, 27, 238 n.28, 275 n.31,

Jonas, Hans, 165, 166, 173, 186-93,

284 n.47

236 n.15, 272 n.3, 276 n.52, 282 n.25,

286 n.17

Julian of N orw ich , 275 n.42

Kant, Imm anuel, 74, 90, 91, 167, 191,

Kierkegaard, Soren,

27, 208, 281 t1.23

Kuklick, Bruce, 42, 107, 244 n.36,

Kiing, Hans, 165, 236 n.

12,

268 n.11,

249 n.2,

272

n.9, 283 n.40

261 n.9

272 n.4 . 278 11-63, 281 11.18, 285 n.52,

286 11.12

Lamont,

Corliss,

171, 192 , 239 1211.35~37;

254 n.39, 273 n.15, 278 n.65

Lawler, jus tus George, 240 n.2

Lazlo, Ervin, 246 n.11

Leibniz, Gottfried, 281 n.19

Lem, Stanislaw, 52, 246 n. 1 0, 268 n. 12,

Lepp, Ignace , 213, 254 11.40, 283 n .36

Levinson, Henry Samuel, 157, 269

nn.17,24, 271 11.35

Livi-Strauss, CIaude, 52

Lewin, Kurt,

240 n.2

Lewis,

H.

.

,

7-8, 152, 200, 202,

270 n.27, 278 n.2

Lifton, Robert Jay, 239 11-35

Linschoten, Hans, 80,

255

n.42

Locke, jo hn , 83, 256 n.7

Love,

287 n.20; and death , 214-15; di-

vine, 143, 193. 208, 217, 226; of God,

159-60, 230, 269 n.18; M arcel on,

277.n.58, 283 n.44

Lovejoy, Arthur, 7, 236 n.13, 237 n.25

Lowe, Victor, 250-51

h.10

Lucretius, 193, 208

Luke, S t., 159, 217 n.42

Lynch, William, 280 n. 17

270 n.30

Macrnurray,

John, 271 n.37

Madden, Edward H., 263, n.25

Madden, Marian C. ,263 n.25

Magnus, Bernd, 275 n.34

Malcolm, Norman, 286 n.10

Maloney,

George, 214,

279 n . 11

Marcel, Gabriel, 253 nn.25,26; 260 n.4,

277 n.88, 282 n.33, 283 n.46; the

body

in , 72-73, 254 11.36; on dea th, 215,

247 n.13, 285 n.9; on love, 215,

283 n.44

Marx, Karl, 157, 180, 201, 223, 224

Materialism, 33, 121, 145, 194,

246 nn.7,9; and

body,

70, 78; Dewey

on , 53-54, 247 n.

IS;

and field meta-

physics,

52-53;

and field-self, xiii,

51-

53; and imm ortality, 7; James on, 73-

74; Marcel on, 71, 247 n. 13; and p ure

experience, 39; Nagel on, 247

n.11;

Randall on , 52

Mathur,

D.

C . , 118-19, 264 n.28

Matthews,

W.

. , 254 n.39

Mattuck,

R . ,

254 11.39

McCarthy, Mary, 277 n.55

M cDerm ott, John J.

,

25, 33, 239 n.

1,

275 nn.36,37;

o n

salvation, 179-85;

ternporalized eschatology in, 179, I81

McTaggart, J.

M .

E.,

271

11.34

Mead, George Herbert,

80,

255 n.41



M eaning, 172, 186,

199;

in Hartshorne,

185-86; in H ockin g, 201, 276 n.47; and

immorta lity, xi-xiii, 221 , 230,

286 n.

IO;

in Jonas, 193;

loss

of,

222;

need for,

166; and new life, 214; in

Nietzsche, 177-78, 275 11.31; and o ther

wo rlds, 212

M eliorism, and salvation, 175

Melsen, Andrew G. M . van, 241 n.14

Merleau-Ponty. M auricc, 243 n.2 9,

253 11n.24,33; 254 n.38, 257

n.14;

body

in, 71,

76

Metaphysical atom ism , in W hitehead, 29

MetaphysiclllJotrmal,

72

Metaphysics, 9 , 105,

151,

168, 190,

264 n.34,

267 n.7 ; in Dewey,

248

nn.15,16;

in Jarncs, xii, 25, 39, 41-

129, 135, 157. 244 n.36. 256 n.5 ,

261 n.12; mechanistic, 55; in prag-

matism,

10, 12,

14, 213; Randall on, 27,

52; spiritualistic, 55; of Wcstern culturc,

xi-xii.

See

also

Field

metaphysics

Mill, John Stuart, 11, 28, 90-91, 130

Miller, Dickinson,

106

Mind, 51, 138, 148, 244 n .33 , 246 n n . 7 , 8 ;

in Dewey, 53-59,

248

n.21;

in

Hume,

90; in

James, 36,

248 n.20, 249 n.24,

257 n.8; in Randall, 47, 49-50,

249 n.23; Searle on, 246 n.9 ; and self,

245 n.4.

See

also Soul; Substance

42, 65, 83, 102, 105, 111, 114-16, 127,

Minkowski, Herrnann, 279 n .

15

M odel, 25, 45-46, 154, 210; in Barbour,

20;

of

the cosmic process,

20, 202-4,

207-8

Molikre, Jean Baptiste Poquelin, 50

M onism, 30, 43, 51, 99, 115, 146-47,

Moody,

R .

A. , 281 n.18

Mooney, Christopher, 202, 214, 278 n.6

Morality, 141, 226-27, 229

Morgan, George, 274 n.31

Morowitz, Harold

j., 46

n.

7

Miinsterberg, Hugo, 83, 257 n . 8

Murphey, Murray G . , 17,

36,

237 n.23,

241 n.19, 243 n.26, 260 n.6

Murphy, Gardner, 280 n. 15

Mussner, Franz, 279 n.8

M uyskens, James L., 83 n.43, 286 n.13

Myers, Frederick, 120, 124, 265 n.42

Myers, Gerald

E., 46 n.8 ,

250

11.3

Mysticism, 28, 62, 136, 256 n.5, 264 n.30

279 n.15

256 n.5, 262 n. 18

Nagel, Th om as, 246

n .

11 ,

247

n. 15,

Neuhaus,

Richard, 272

n.

12

Neutral

monism,

35-36,

42,

55

N ew life, 46, 161, 173, 196, 199-200, 203,

230; and con tinuity w ith present life,

207-12; and dea th, 212-13; duration

and transformation, 204, 209-12; ncga-

tive characteristics of, 216-17; positive

characteristics of, 212-16;

and

responsi-

bility, 225

277 n.57

Niebuhr, Reinhold, 272 n.11

Nietzsche, Fricdrich, 22, 27,

180-81,

207,

227,

237 n. 16, 238 n.33, 266 n.

I ,

267 n.4, 268 11.13, 269 11.25, 273 n.

19,

274 nn.26-31,

275

nn.34,35, 279

11.14,

281 n.21;

on

Christianity, 287 n.21;

concern for the futu re, 201; hymn to

“eternity,” 208; critique of immortality.

176-79; on philosophers, 9; o n salva-

tion, 183; and self-deception, 223-24;

on ‘‘socratic rationalism ,” 3

Nihilism, xi, 129, 266 n.45; in Nietzsche,

177-78, 274 nn . 28,30

Norton, David L., 78 n.3, 283

n.40

Novelty,

11,

98-99, 147, 209, 260 n.7,

261

n.13;

and free dom , 114-15; and a n

infinite God,

269

n.22; and tim e, 204;

in Whitehead,

188,

258 n.18

Nozick, Robert, 255 n. 1, 258 n.17

Objectivism: Dewey on, 50-51; and God,

Og den, Schubert

M.,

166,

272

n.6

Omnipotence, 150, 152, 160, 216,

Omniscience, 150, 216, 266

n.44,

O ptim ism , and salvation, 176

Overbelief.

See

Beiief; Extrapolation

Overman, 177-79, 201, 224, 238 n.33;

and “death of

God,”

375 nn.31,32

133

285

TI.

52

285 n.52

Panactivism, 30, 42, 96, 261 n.12

Pannenberg, Wolfhart, 272 n. 12

Panpsychism, 30, 42, 96, 244 n.36,

Pantheism: pluralistic, 143-48, 269 n.2 4

Parapsychological, 112-13, 263 nn .22,23

“Passing Tho ught.” 89. 91. 93. 111 129;

and full self, 94-95, 128; and irnmor-

tality, 68,

84;

and personal identity, 85-

89; and substantive self,

89,

91

261 n.12



h d e x 295

Paul, S t., 69, 191, 252 n.21

Peirce, C harles Sanders, 17, 153, 246 n.8,

Penelhum, Terence,

245 n . 4

Pericles, 276 n.50

Perry, John , 255 n. 1, 257 n. 10

Perry, Ralph Bar ton , 61, 112,

1

14,

236 n.9, 237 n.24, 239 n.2 , 242 n.19,

244 n.34 , 245 n.6, 250 nn.5,7,

256 nn .6,7, 359 nn.29,34 , 259-60 n. 1,

264

n.34,

67 n.5, 276 n.52 , 280 11.18,

283 11.41, 286

n. l

1; on consciousness in

James, 97, 1 16, 153, 265 n.42; on con-

tinuity inJam es, 105, 260 n.7; o n du-

alism in James, 255 n.2; o n experience

in James, 33, 28, 79; on feelings in

James, 63; tin God inJarnes, 134,

150;

on identity in James, 83, ,262 n. 19; o n

imm orrality, 213-14, 274 n.25,

277 n.59; on m ind inJam es, 42; on ni-

hilism in James, 129; on novelty in

James, 261

n.

13; o n pragm atic evalua-

tion i n James, 17-19; on radical em-

piricism in James,

102

276 n.47; in Aquinas, 190; in Barbour,

259 n.32; and body, 70, 254 n .40 ; in

Chisholm, 252 n.9; relation to God,

124, 225-26; in Harp er, 158; in Hock-

ing, 254 11.37; sup erhum an 151-52; val-

ue

of, 190-91.

See also

Individual, the

Personal identity, xiii, 85, 88, 255 n.

1,

266

n.46;

in Chisholm , 256 n.4; and

continuity, 83-87; and feelings, 82-86;

and imm ortality, 81;

and “passing

Th ou gh t,” 85-89; in Shoem aker,

254 n.39

265 n . 39, 272 n .9 , 287 n . 19

Person, 7, 109, 123, 192-93, 232,

Pessimism, and salvation, 175

Philosophical theology.

6,

13, 132, 217,

Physical, 47, 247 n . 15. See aIso Pure expe-

235 n.1

rience, and physical and psychica l

(mental)

Plato, 3, 70, 257

n.8;

Platonism, 41

Pluralism, 14, 146-47, 155, 174; and evil,

151;

and fields,

30;

and

God,

137, 149,

150, 269 11.22;

in

James, 267 n.9; and

novelty, 99, 115, 147

Pluralistic Universe, 41, 42, 60, 62, 92,

101-2, 106-7, 109, 113, 115, 121-23,

125, 127, 144,146

Polanyi, Michael, 246 n. 11

Pollock, Robert, 28, 240

n . 6

Pragmatic evaluation, 15-20,

169;

of

im-

mortality, 232

Pragnratis,n,

17

Pragmatism, 14-15, 70, 175, 203, 223-24,

267 n.6,

80

11.18;

nd A urobindo,

278 n.7; and the conc rete, 28-29, 62;

and evil, 216; and faith, 167-69, 176,

238 n.30; and

God,

133; in James, 18;

and materialism, 52-53; and new life,

200, 213; and the relational self, 158,

213, 215; and t he soul, 48-50.

See

also

Metaphysics, in pragmatism; Pragmatic

evaluation

Pratt, James

B.,

278

n.65

Prayer, 140, 268 n. 14

Price, H.H., 265 n.41

Principles of

Psychology,

xiii, 36,

39,

60, 68,

74,

SO,

81-82, 84,

90,

92, 94-95, 97,

102,106,111-12,114,122,129-30,

158

Pringle-Pattison, A . Seth, 281 n.22

Process, in Dewey, 56 ,

58

Process and Reality,

12,

188

Processive-relational: character

of

Dewey’s

metaphysics, 55-59; character

of

ields,

27, 29,

43,

142, 253 n.32; view of

G od,

xiii-xiv; character

of

“lived

body,”

71

;

character of the self, xiii-xiv,

65,

102;

character of he world (reality), 14-17,

45,

110,

127, 133, 174, 202, 241 n.18.

See

also

Experience, and fields; Field

metaphysics; Reality; World, the

Proust,

Marcel,

73,

271 n.38

Psychical, 47. See also Pure experience,

and physical and psychical (mental)

Psychology: Briefer C o t m e ,

86,

88

Pure Ego, 66,

81,

258 nn . 19, 25; in James,

27, 68, 86, 258 n. 19; in Kant, 91. See

nlso

Ego,

he

Pure experience, 55,

260

n.1 , 262 n.

18;

and the concrete, 33, 38; and con-

sciousness, 38-39, 112, 126; description

of,

34; and fields, 32, 37 , 39-40,

240 n.3, 241 n. 19; flux character of,

40-

41;

McD ermott on, 33; and physical

and psychical (mental), 34-35,

38-40,

42-43, 106,’ 126-27, 242 11.24,

248 n.15; Seigfried o n , 37-38, 243

n.31;

Stevens

on,

242 n.20; Wild on,

243 n.28; W ilshire on , 242 nn.22,24

Quinton, Anthony, 280

n . 1 5



296 Itrdex

Radical empiricism, 32, 36, 38, 39, 71,

90.

128; and causal effkacy, 98; Perry on,

102;

and pluralism, 147-48.

See

also Ex-

perience; Pure experience

Rahner, Karl, 245 n.5, 283 n.37

Raju, P. T., 280 n . 15

Randall, John Her ma n,

Jr.,

6, 27-28,

235 n. 1, 238 11.28, 240 nn ,5,9; 244 n.3 ,

247 n.12, 271 n.2; on immortality, 194;

on metaphysics, 52;

on

mind, 47-50,

249 n.23

Reality: as centers o f activity, 30 , 96; and

“death of God ,” 266 n. 1; in Dewey, 55,

248 nn.16,18; and faith in

God,

141;

flux character

of,

40-41, 85, 102, 143-

44, 203-4, 256 n.8, 259 n.29, 260 n.2;

o fG o d , 117, 119, 121, 134, 142, 148,

149, 155.

158,

168, 174, 177, 226,

231,

270 n.31; and immediate perception

(feeling), 62, 98, 235 n .8 , 243 n.24; in

James, 180, 260 11.3;

f

other worlds,

205-7; and pluralism, 146, 149; ra-

tionality o f , 148; in Whitehead, 187. See

also,

Experience; Field(s); Processive-

relational, character of the world; Pure

experience; World, the

Refirtation of D t d i s r n ,

T h e ,

7

Reid, Thomas, 85, 257 n.10

Religion. 13, 112,139-42, 157, 159, 224,

260 n .5, 268 n.11, 279 n.9; in Bellah,

266-67 n.3; and immo rtality, 172, 194;

in James, 99, 134, 137-40, 268 n. 14,

270 n.31, 285 n.7; and morality, 141;

and science (reason), 4-5,

15,

113-15,

135,147, 167, 236 n n. I2 ,1 4; and self-

deception, 223-25

Renan, Joseph E rnest, 186

Resurrection , 173 , 194-98, 202 , 278 n.62,

280 n.15;

n Aquinas, 252

n.21;

Blenkinsopp on, 195-97; o f body, 69,

252 n.21; of Christ,

210,

212; and field-

self, 46; and immortality,

239

n.34;

symbolic, 198, 239 n.37.

See

also

Belief

in personal im m orta lity; Death, and

resurrection

Ricoeur, Paul, 267 n.4, 273

n.

17

Rilke, Rainer Maria, 185, 267 n.4,

Rorty, Amelie O kse nb erg , 254-255 n.40,

Roth, John K.,

153,

270 n.29

Royce, Josiah, 242 11.21,283 11.40,

275 nn.35,43

255 n . 1

284 11.48

Russell, Bertrand, 21,

35,

239 n.38,

Ryle, Gilbert, 257 n.14

Salvation,

5,

143, 168, 202, 217,

225;

in

James, 145, 375-76; M cD erm ott on ,

179-85; Nietzsche

on,

183, 270 11.25

Santayana, Geo rge, 189, 208, 246 n.8,

276 11-57, 282 n.24

Sartre, Jean-Paul, 71, 73, 227, 253 n.23,

254 n.36, 257 n. 14

Scheler, Max, 5, 70, 252 n.22

Schiller, F. C.

S . ,

157

Schilpp, Paul Arthur, 235 n.5, 24011.10,

247 n.14 , 285 t1.8

Schleirmacher, Friedrich, 208, 281 n.22

Science, 16, 123, 137, 238 n.36; and faith

in personal immortality, 271 n.2; and

G od , 157; James on , 14, 138; and re-

ligion, 4-5, 15, 113-15, 119, 136,167,

236 n.14

269 n.18

Searle, Joh n R. , 246 n.9

Seigfried, Charlene, 37, 39, 41-42,

Self-deception, 181, 223-24, 286 n.18 .

Shea, Joh n, 213, 245

n.5,

280 n.16

Shoemaker, Sydney, 254 11-40

Shoonen berg, Piet, 213

Silverman, Hugh J., 257 n. 12

Smith, jo h n , 209, 236 n. 12, 264 11.30,

Some

Problenls

of

Philosophy,

62, 98-99,

“Something more,” 67-68, 80, 102-5,

242 n.21, 243 n.31, 253 11-31

See also “Bad faith”

268 n.15, 282 n.28

102, 115, 129

121-24,

129,

207, 269 n. 15;

in

Marcel,

260 n.4

Fechner’s earth soul,

325;

contrasted

with field-self, 131; in Goethe, 213;

and immortality, 49, 130-31

;

James o n ,

48-50, 67,

74,

79, 87, 130; contrasted

with “passing Thought,” 89; salvation

of, 168; n Un am un o, 194, 197, 238; in

Whitehead,

271

n.41. See also Indi-

vidual, the; M ind; Perso n; Substance

Soul, 22, 61, 70, 91, 129, 282 n.31;

Spencer, Herbert, 156, 170-71

Spinoza, Benedict, 157

Stambaugh, Joan, 275 nn.32-33

Steiner, George, 277 n.60

Steiner, Rudolph, 280 n. 18

Stevens, Richard, 35-36, 236 n .

1 1,

240 n.3, 242 n.20,

243

nn.27,30,31,

Eugene Fontinell - Self, God and Immortality

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