Part 8 (1/2)

As you sit thinking, a cohts run in many diverse lines Yet with all this diversity, your h your thinking all takes place in e call the present ely in terms of past experiences_

1 THE PART PLAYED BY PAST EXPERIENCE

PRESENT THINKING DEPENDS ON PAST EXPERIENCE--Is you have seen or heard or felt; of things you have thought of before and which now recur to you; of things you res that you do not re to it nevertheless--these are the things which forive content to your thinking Youon now, or of one that is to occur in the future; but, after all, you are dependent on your past experience for theof the presentwhich does not link itself to soe Indian in the pri a deer with a riflea battery of uns on his enes were related to his past experience; hence he could not think in such terms

THE PRESENT INTERPRETED BY THE PAST--Not only can we not think at all except in terms of our past experience, but even if we could, the present would be ht of the past The sedate man of affairs who decries athletic sports, and has never taken part in them, cannot understand the wild enthusiasm which prevails between rival teams in a hotly contested event The fine work of art is to the one who has never experienced the appeal which coated patches of color Paul says that Jesus was ”unto the Greeks, foolishness” He was foolishness to the in their experience with their own Gods had been enough like the character of Jesus to enable them to interpret Him

THE FUTURE ALSO DEPENDS ON THE PAST--To thepast experience, the future also would be impossible; for we can look forward into the future only by placing in its experiences the elee who has never seen the shi+ning yellow metal does not dreaold, but rather of a ”happy hunting ground” If you will analyze your own dreams of the future you will see in theether in new for, in their elements, from your past experience nevertheless All that would ree of time which we call the ”present ht would be i to compare and relate

Personality would not exist; for personality requires continuity of experience, else we should be a new person each succeeding moment, without memory and without plans Such a mind would be no mind at all

RANK DETERMINED BY ABILITY TO UTILIZE PAST EXPERIENCE--So i our present thinking and guiding our future actions, that the place of an individual in the scale of creation is deterely by the ability to profit by past experience The scientist tells us of many species of animals now extinct, which lost their lives and suffered their race to die out because when, long ago, the clirow much colder, they were unable to use the experience of suffering in the last cold season as an incentive to provide shelter, orof the next and orous one Man was able toand shelter and food, he survived, while ain and again dares the flaives its life, a sacrifice to its folly; the burned child fears the fire, and does not the second time seek the experience So also can the efficiency of an individual or a nation, as compared with other individuals or nations, be determined The inefficient are those who repeat the same error or useless act over and over, or else fail to repeat a chance useful act whose repetition ht lead to success They are unable to learn their lesson and be guided by experience Their past does not sufficiently h it direct their future

2 HOW PAST EXPERIENCE IS CONSERVED

PAST EXPERIENCE CONSERVED IN BOTH MENTAL AND PHYSICAL TERMS--If past experience plays so important a part in our welfare, how, then, is it to be conserved so that we may secure its benefits? Here, as elsewhere, we find thein perfect unison and har its part to further the interests of both The results of our past experience may be read in both our mental and our physical nature

On the physical side past experience is recorded inon the tissues of the body, and particularly on the delicate tissues of the brain and nervous system

This is easily seen in its outward aspects The stooped shoulders and bent form of the workman tell a tale of physical toil and exposure; the bloodless lips and pale face of the victi hours, and insufficient food; the rosy cheek and bounding step of childhood speak of fresh air, good food and happy play

On the mental side past experience is conserved chiefly by es_, _ideas_, and _concepts_ The nature and function of concepts will be discussed in a later chapter It will now be our purpose to exaes and ideas, and to note the part they play in the mind's activities

THE IMAGE AND THE IDEA--To understand the nature of the io back to the percept You look at a watch which I hold before your eyes and secure a percept of it Briefly, this is what happens: The light reflected fro the retina, results in a nerve current which sets up a certain form of activity in the cells of the visual brain area, and lo! a _percept_ of the watch flashes in your mind

Now I put the watch in er present to your eye Then I ask you to think ofat it; or youit to you In either case _the cellular activity in the visual area of the cortex is reproduced_ approximately as it occurred in connection with the percept, and lo! an _ie is thus an approximate copy of a former percept (or several percepts) It is aroused indirectly byby way of some other brain center, instead of directly by the stian, as in the case of a percept

If, instead of seeking a more or less exact eneral _old, that it is for the purpose of keeping time, that it was a present to me, that I wear it in my left pocket, you then have an _idea_ of the watch Our idea of an object is, therefore, the generalof relations we ascribe to it It should be ree and idea are eeneral unifor writers in their use

ALL OUR PAST EXPERIENCE POTENTIALLY AT OUR COMMAND--Ies may in a certain sense take the place of percepts, and we can again experience sights, sounds, tastes, and s the stimuli actually present to the senses In this way all our past experience is potentially available to the present All the objects we have seen, it is potentially possible again to see in the ed to have the objects before us; all the sounds we have heard, all the tastes and sain have presented to our es without the various stians of the senses

Through ies and ideas the total number of objects in our experience is infinitely s we have seen, or heard, or sain have present to the senses, and without this poould never get theain And besides this fact, it would be inconvenient to have to go and secure afresh each sensation or percept every tiht While _habit_, then, conserves our past experience on the physical side, the _i on the mental side

3 INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN IMAGERY

IMAGES TO BE VIEWED BY INTROSPECTION--The rees will be easier to understand, for each of you can know just what isof you not to think that I ae, a curiosity connected with our thinking which has been discovered by scholars who have delved more deeply into the matter than we can hope to do Every day--no, es are flitting through our e part of our stream of consciousness Let us see whether we can turn our attention within and discover soht Let us introspect

I know of no better way to proceed than that adopted by Francis Galton years ago, when he asked the English men of letters and science to think of their breakfast tables, and then describe the ies which appeared

I a, but I want to warn you beforehand that the ies will not be so vivid as the sensory experiences theue, and less clear and definite; they will be fleeting, and e may fade entirely out, and the idea only be left

THE VARIED IMAGERY SUGGESTED BY ONE'S DINING TABLE--Let each one now recall the dining table as you last left it, and then answer questions concerning it like the following: