The Physical Basis of Immortality

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G.P. Putnam, 1876 - 324 pages

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Page 255 - ... other noises; — who knows, I say, but that it may be possible to discover the motions of the internal parts of bodies, whether animal, vegetable or mineral, by the sound they make; that one may discover the works performed in the several offices and shops of a man's body, and thereby discover what instrument or engine is out of order, what works are going on at several times and lie still at others and the like.
Page 296 - We are in this fix : mental states and bodily states are utterly contrasted ; they cannot be compared, they have nothing in common except the most general of all attributes, degree, and order in time ; when engaged with one we must be oblivious of all that distinguishes the other.
Page 228 - ... for every fact of consciousness, whether in the domain of sense, of thought, or of emotion, a certain definite molecular condition is set up in the brain...
Page 295 - ... longer. Such states are of short duration, mere fits, glimpses; they are constantly shifted and alternated with object states, but while they last and have their full power we are in a different world ; the material world is blotted out, eclipsed, for the instant unthinkable. These subject-moments are studied to advantage in bursts of intense pleasure, or intense pain, in fits of engrossed reflection, especially reflection upon mental facts ; but they are seldom sustained in purity beyond a very...
Page 91 - ... and annihilation lie outside of her domain. The mutual convertibility of forces into each other is called correlation of forces ; the persistence of the same amount, amid all these protean forms, is called conservation of force * * In recent works the word energy is used to designate active or working force as distinguished from passive or non-working force. It is in this working condition only that force is conserved, and therefore conservation of energy is the proper expression. Nevertheless,...
Page 255 - There may also be a possibility,' writes Hooke, ' of discovering the internal motions and actions of bodies by the sound they make. Who knows but that, as in a watch, we may hear the beating of the balance, and the running of the wheels, and the striking of the hammers, and the grating of the teeth, and multitudes of other noises ; who knows, I say, but that it may be possible to discover the motions of the internal parts of bodies, whether animal, vegetable, or mineral, by the sound they make...
Page 256 - I have this encouragement not to think all these things utterly impossible, though never so much derided by the generality of men, and never so seemingly mad, foolish, and...
Page 234 - ... the passage from the current to the needle, if not demonstrable, is thinkable, and that we entertain no doubt as to the final mechanical solution of the problem. But the passage from the physics of the brain to the corresponding facts of consciousness is unthinkable. Granted that a definite thought and a definite molecular action in the brain occur simultaneously; we do not possess the intellectual organ, nor apparently any rudiment of the organ, which would enable us to pass by a process of...
Page 295 - ... of the May-blossom ; we give way for a moment to the sensation of sweetness ; for that moment the objective regards cease ; we think of nothing extended ; we are in a state where extension has no footing ; there is, to us, place no longer. Such states are of short duration, mere fits, glimpses; they are constantly shifted and alternated with object states, but while they last and have their full power we are in a different world ; the material world is blotted out, eclipsed, for the instant unthinkable....
Page 294 - From the ingress of a sensation, to the outgoing responses in action, the mental succession is not for an instant dissevered from a physical succession.

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