instance, but when the concept appears in psychology to-day, the presumption is that it is a point of view for the work in hand.
As an illustration of psychophysical parallelism on a very elaborate scale and of the distinction between description and explanation, I purpose to go somewhat at length into the principle work of Richard Avenarius, his 'Kritik der Reinen Erfahrung.' I am the more disposed to this undertaking since Avenarius has. it seems to me, been very generally misunderstood, and I think unjustly.
III
I will say at once that the aim of the 'Kritik der Reinen Erfahrung' is to be a contribution to natural science, and that it is not a system of metaphysics. The interest that it appeals to is primarily the interest in psychology; it appeals also to the interest in sociology and history.
That it should not have been so understood is explicable enough. The title reminds us of Kant. A 'Kritik der Reinen Erfahrung' must, one thinks, have a good deal in common with the 'Kritik der Reinen Vernunft.' Also, the author was a professor of philosophy at Zurich; his earlier works were a monograph on Spinoza and an attempt to define philosophy as the effort to conceive the world according to a mechanical principle. His later work, 'Der Menschliche Weltbegriff,' had a good deal to say about idealism, and he himself was the editor of one of the principal philosophical quarterlies.
In view of these facts, one took up the 'Kritik der Reinen Erfahrung' expecting to find, if not positive metaphysics, at least a criticism of metaphysical concepts. If we add to this a disposition to skip the notes in fine print, we have reasons enough for misunderstanding the work before us.
A remark which Avenarius makes in a note is a good introduction to his point of view. "As we have learned," he says, "to think of the nourishment of organisms, of their recovery from injuries and sickness, of their adaptations to changes in their environment without the intervention of the soul, so we have now to learn to think of the so-called purposive changes in the central nervous system without calling in a soul (Geist) to help explain, a soul whose own psychic changes would have to be first explained."[1]
We may like this point of view or we may not; it is, in either case, an important psychological point of view at the present time. Psychology seeks to describe those mental activities which are its subject-matter by formulating laws of their occurrence and in making out psychophysical relations wherever they can be found, and
- ↑ 'Kr. der R. Erf.,' I., p. 202.
