It is clear that this doctrine of selection as applied to muscular movement does away with all necessity for holding that consciousness even directs brain energy. The need of such direction seems to me to be as artificial as Darwin's principle showed the need of special creation to be for the teleological adaptations of the different species. In another place I hope to take up the psychology of Prof. Cope's new book in some detail. Since writing this I have heard Prof. Osborn read a paper which confirms the agreement between him and me which I supported in the text above. I reached my conclusion independently and one of my Science articles gives report of it as expressed in a criticism of Romanes before the New York Academy of Science on Jan. 31st, 1896.
Conscious states do have a causal relation to the other organic processes.
Mental Development p. 179. Spenser and Bain hold that the selection is of purely chance adaptations among spontaneous random movements. The Mead Project. All rights reserved. The text of the document presented here is in the public domain.