CHAPTER FIVE

THE WORLD OF EVERYDAY PERCEPTION, ITS TWO ASPECTS

MODERN science explains the existing world as a mechanical system, an order of physical events. Its success represents perhaps the most notable achievement of human thought and certainly we have no reason to question the validity of its conclusions within the field marked off by its own aim and method of approach.

Our query is whether another explanation of the world as organized by the values of personal life and association may not also be valid. Whether, more definitely, the religious view of the world as spiritually organized is necessarily inconsistent with the conclusions of science and whether it is not

67

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
68

supported by evidence of equal weight drawn from human experience and human experiment

Are there, then, any facts or features of the world of everyday experience which can serve as an empirical basis for another interpretation besides the scientific? I mean features of existing objects which all can perceive, facts which are open to the experience of everybody.

We think at once of the great variety of different qualities which things present We think of the colors and the sounds, the tastes and odors, the textures and temperatures of things. These diverse qualities seem to belong more intimately to the objects which possess them than do the physical properties. Thus it is the familiar bright red which marks the mail box as receptacle for my letters; it is the clusters of fragrant purple blossoms among masses of green leaves which make the

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
69

lilac bush beautiful to look at; it is the cut and color of clothing, the cast of feature and staccato footfall which identify the moving figure as that of an acquaintance hurrying away to his morning work.

Now it is just this wealth of different qualities apparent in the world which physical science, as we have seen, neglects and finally erases from the picture. Yet just these different qualities give to things their distinctive character. And not their distinctive character merely, but such interest and value as they possess. So the apple whose location in that dish merely gives it place in my visual field and has little or no connection with any of its intrinsic qualities as an apple--this apple appeals to me because of its ripe color, its fragrance, and its presumed crispness and sweetness, each reinforcing the other and blending in an attractive harmony. So the blue sky, the bright sun and the fresh breeze

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
70

of a summer morning, and the warmth and color and texture and snug fit of a winter coat.

It would be a mistake, of course, to represent these different qualities which things possess as altogether separate from their physical attributes or to suggest that the two have nothing to do with one another. As we well know, color is frequently a sign of distance and size and weight. Sound and odor often serve to signify location and motion. Texture and temperature are frequently indices of purely physical properties. On the other hand, it is equally well-known that size and shape and proportion are inseparable from color-pattern and help to determine the distinctive character,, the essential nature we attribute to objects. In the illustrations just used the familiar shape as well as the color identifies the mailbox, and the height, proportion, and rate of movement help to identify

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
71

the moving figure as that of a man. No, the difference is not simply between the spatial and quantitative properties of objects, on the one hand, and the whole variety of other qualities, on the other. It is primarily a difference in meaning and, as such, has fundamental importance. In the one class we have those properties called geometrical and mechanical which define the external relations which objects sustain to other objects collocated with them in the physical system. In the other class. we have those diverse qualities which characterize objects intrinsically, which constitute in their varying combinations the distinctive nature which each possesses.

It is certainly a striking fact that science in its interpretations of the world leaves out of account the very qualities which give meaning and value to objects. This of itself would be sufficient reason for questioning the completeness and adequacy of the scientific explanation.

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
72

But if we are to base any conclusions or build any arguments upon the nature and importance of these diverse qualities, let us at first be sure that they exist as an authentic and ineradicable feature of the world we perceive. For one certainly gets the impression from some current expositions of the scientific view that these “secondary” qualities, colors and sounds, tastes, odors, and the like, are simply eliminated from the actual world when the white light of scientific intelligence is turned on it.

Are these qualitative differences then inseparable from the world we perceive and the objects it contains? Are the objects which ,we encounter and observe from day to day really complexes or patterns of different qualities? If now we consider how we come by our perceptions of the world and the objects it contains we shall see how essential to the

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
75

world as we know it, how ineradicable from the world, such diversity of quality is.

Our perceptions of the world which is the common theater of our human life and action arise as the result of two responses. These two responses work together; they are in fact parts of one response which we as living individuals make to our external environment. The first is that of bodily movement, of the successive motor adjustments called forth by the external stimuli which play upon our sense organs without cessation during our waking hours. We stop to listen; we turn to look; we wince and draw back the hand; we start and jump. These motor reactions are not originally voluntary, we do not “intend” them; they are reflexive, instinctive, habitual. We find ourselves making them, and they are, as we know, the imperative conditions of organic survival. They are simply to be accepted as the price we pay for continuing to live and

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
74

act. But we cannot thus respond to our environment with continuous motor readjustment without (so far as we are conscious at all) acknowledging the external existence of the objects which evoke the successive movements.

So far as we are intelligent, however, we do more than acknowledge the external existence of the stimulus, we refer the response to the particular object which here and now evokes it. Our sensory-motor responses to external stimuli when they reach a certain degree of complexity are accompanied by another response which we may call that of intelligent interpretation. That sound (which makes me stop and listen) I recognize as the ringing of the telephone bell; the moving shadow (which causes me to turn and look) I see to be that of a man passing my window; the stinging pain (which makes me wince and rub my hand) I perceive to be that of a mosquito bite.

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
75

This is the response of our intelligence, which locates and recognizes and interprets objects by attributing to them certain distinctive qualities and relations which, for our purposes, identify them. The qualities are the ones just referred to as giving character to our world: shapes and colors, sizes and distances, tones and rhythms, motions and weights and textures, tastes and smells, temperatures and impacts. In different blends and patterns they combine to constitute the nature of objects and these in their turn are woven by various relations into the structure of our world.

Thus we become aware of the world of everyday perception, by a combined response of sensory-motor mechanisms and active intelligence. The two work in closest functional interdependence: intelligence is aroused to activity by incipient motor responses to sensory stimuli while these movements are directed

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
76

to completion by the interpretation which intelligence puts on the stimulus. The sound which checks the writing movements of my fingers and causes my bead to turn slightly towards the door I recognize as the footsteps of some one approaching my door and I drop, my pen to meet an expected caller.

As we should suppose from these fundamental facts, the qualities we perceive in things have a direct bearing upon action. Since it is practical interest that determines what objects are perceived we should expect that the resulting perception would bear directly, upon the fulfillment of this practical interest. In order to understand how it does, we shall have to consider the way in which a practical interest gains fulfillment or realization. Suppose that my notice is attracted by a particular style of cap in a show-window, a style of cap, I have long wanted. How in this case does my interest gain fulfilment? By my going

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
77

into the shop, finding a cap of the desired sort in my own size, paying the price, and carrying it away to be worn at my pleasure. As long as I merely perceived the cap in the shop-window I was prevented by actual conditions from enjoying its possession and use, from noting how it looked on my head, from putting it to ordinary wear and appreciating its jaunty appearance, its comfortable fit. In order to realize these qualities I had to make the series of movements which were required in order so to change my own position relative to the perceived object that I could freely and without hindrance make the movements involved in appropriating, examining, and enjoying it.

In the fulfillment of a practical interest, as this example shows, two steps must be taken. First, the bodily movements must be made which directly or through a chain of physical intermediaries put one in possession of the

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
78

desired object or, at least, in such close proximity to, or effectual control of it, that one is able freely and fully to examine and enjoy its characteristic qualities. These motor responses are made under external conditions set by the physical environment, and hence are subject to check and control by the results that eventuate as the movement proceeds. Second, the constituent qualities of the object in their distinctive pattern must be freely explored and enjoyed through the sensory and motor responses (such as handling, manipulating, listening, tasting, smelling, and the like) requisite for such appreciative realization.

Now these two steps involved in the fulfillment of a practical interest are reflected in the two classes of attributes which perceived objects are observed to possess. Here in the conditions of purposive action, then, we find the original source of this outstanding feature of

THE, RELIGIOUS RESPONSE 79

the world of everyday perception. The physical properties of things, such as location and distance relative to surrounding objects, size and shape, rate and direction of motion, relate themselves to our powers of bodily movement, each individual occupying as he does the center of his own field of vital reaction and motor response. Their primary function is to indicate or map out the movements which the individual must make in order to appropriate or to avoid (for escape is sometimes a positive practical interest) the observed object'. The second class of qualities relate themselves to our powers of appreciation and enjoyment. It is by virtue of the varied qualities which they combine into attractive patterns or harmonies that objects appeal to human individuals as sources of possible satisfaction. Perceptions are, therefore, plans of action and promises of satisfaction; they map out courses

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
80

of possible movements and identify sources of possible satisfaction.

But while objects attract our attention and afford us use and enjoyment by virtue of the different qualities which are combined in them, is it true that all qualities and complexes of qualities perceived in objects make this appeal to us or hold forth this promise of satisfaction? Certainly it is not a fact that all qualities possessed by objects attract us or promise on closer acquaintance to afford us satisfaction. Many objects by their distinctive character repel us with the threat of pain and dissatisfaction, and prompt us to avoid them as quickly and completely as possible.

Such objects have an interest for us, a negative value, one may say; the response they evoke promises at least the satisfaction of escape. But are we not indifferent to many of the qualities, the sights and the sounds, the feels and the tastes and odors which the

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
81

things around us have or would have if we cared to take the trouble to investigate them? No doubt every human individual is at a particular time indifferent to the character of most of the things in the world; he is absorbed in the pursuit of urgent present aims. But it does not follow that he will always be indifferent to the nature of the objects he now disregards. Nor does it follow that his fellows will not discover that the qualities he never deigns to notice have a lively practical import and interest for mankind. Indeed, as men explore and exploit the resources of the existing world they are bringing within the range of human concern and possible satisfaction more and more objects to whose qualities mankind has been wholly indifferent. Thus it is impossible to say that the distinctive character of any existing object is without human interest and value. Indeed, as man's intellectual curiosity

THE RELIGIOUS RESPONSE
82

grows and his technical proficiency improves, he proceeds increasingly on the assumption that no natural object or force is without rational significance and possible use. Can we not then agree that value is a principle of correlation and organization among existing objects as universal as that of physical causation?