The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1911-03-10
DR.. FUNK ANSWERS
THOMAS A. EDISON
Brain Not Merely "a Piece of Meat
Mechanism" He Declares-Man
Is Immortal.

reference works of wide renown, has
taken it upon himself to answer an
interview recently given out by
Thomas a. Edison in which that
celebrated Wizard denies that
there is future existence.
DR.. Funks reply is generally re-
garded as being as scientific and an
alytical as Mr.. Edison's original as
sertion, to- say nothing of being more
cheerful THE CITIZEN herewith
reproduces it in full:
The interview with Thomas A. Edi-
son on Immortality, published last
October, is still awakening much in
| terest, even in faraway countries.
mo soul" death ends ALL" "the
brain piece of meat mechanism"
that produces thought as the liver
secretes bile, having an individuality
only as has New York city with its
five millions of human brains, each
brain combination of millions of
cells; when New York city disinte-
CRATES, it's individuality is gone;
when our brain dies, that ends us.
Is there, or not, another side of
the Great Divide?" At death does
our boat sink to another sea, or are
we and it wrecked for evermore?
| That interview with Mr.. Edison,
backed by his personality and by the
memory of his seven hundred pat
ents, seems destined, like the sun
set gun, to travel around and around
the earth. The storm may be over,
but the sea still runs high. AS we
are now in the more quiet after
math, may l not venture to ask for
space for a thought or two which
I l find granite under my feet at
threescore years and ten-at an age
when Mr.. Edison and myself are apt
to think soberly of the valley and
shadow" and-what next?
If any man at whose gate the
black camel is preparing to kneel
has a thought on this subject, es-
pecially if it is drawn from expert
ence-a thought which he finds
worth while-he owes it to his fell
lows to tell it.
Mr.. Edison is right in this: None
of our five senses, nor all combined,
can reveal Immortality, much less
demonstrate it. The ear cannot see,
the eye cannot hear. Magnify light
million times, yet the ear could
not hear it. Every sense is shut up
dDoOIuLSly III us OWN IGdlulJ UuL lie
is a bold scientist who would say
that there are no realms other than
those covered by these five senses.
There may be ten thousand other
groups of five or more senses each.
Why not? Does Mr.. Edison say l am
guessing in this? ! might reply
with equal reason that he is guess
ing when he denies it.; and were
these two guesses precisely equal,
is it not more natural if not more
scientific, to choose the optimistic
one? But they are not equal.
There are channels of knowledge
other than these five senses. Bee
thoven, stone deaf, heard magnifi-
cent music which he wrote down in
great oratorios that have stood the
test of time. There is whole range
of spiritual senses, each of which
takes in knowledge up to the level of
| its development. There is a beauty
which the eye cannot see; music
which the ear cannot hear. Would
| Mr.. Edison deny this? The brutal
son can have no conception of
mothers love, although his five
senses are perfect. He has eyes and
ears but sees and hears not what
many other men see and hear clear
| ly. Conceptions of right and wrong
are absolutely real, but real only to
conscience. The pure in heart see
God, and others cannot. When Bis
hop Brooks spoke of God to deaf and
| blind Helen Keller, she was not sur
prised. She said that she long knew
there must be some one. By some
! channel other than the five senses
this thought had got into her mind.
| That was a profound utterance of
Jesus, that if a man would do right
| he would know. To do is to exer-
else, and to exercise is to grow. The
exercise of a faculty develops that
! faculty, and then up to it's level it
will know truth.
Mr.. Edison is sure the brain is
not an organ of thought as the piano
is an organ of the music it conveys
to our ears from the soul of a Hof-
mann; but Edison says the brain is a
machine that creates thought. End
the brain machine, he tells us, and
you end the man; some bias, he ad-
mits, is given by heredity, for in
some way in the catacombs of the
brain cells our ancestors lie en-
tombed. But what of the countless
millions of thoughts that control the
! uhlN SlSC--InOuSH Sl IldJ are OIH6I
than mans? Whence come these
thoughts? Where is the brain box"
of the universe? Herbert Spencer,
the chiefest thinker of modern times,
closes his system of philosophy with
the thought that there is in the uni
verse a power other than man that
makes for righteousness.
If there can be no thought with
I out a brain machine, where is the
brain machine of this power other
than mans? Where is the brain
power that is in control of the uni
verse? If, on the other hand, there
can be thought without brain, what
becomes of Mr.. Edison's argument
that the destruction of the brain ends
man? Is not his conclusion the
baseless fabric of an unscientific
| theory? He has wandered all too
far from the "watchfires of the
tribe
But the pity of it is, his words do
not hit upon rock, but upon palpitat-
ing heart and brain. There are 1,