Driesch The History and Theory of Vitalism
11/12/07: Hans Driesch, The History and Theory of Vitalism, trans. and ed. by C.K. Ogden (New York: Macmillan, 1914).
The main concern of Vitalism is not whether the processes of life can be called purposive, but rather if the purposiveness is the result of a special constellation of factors known already, or if it is the result of an autonomy peculiar to the processes themselves. So then, the notion of vitalism essentially concerns whether or not this purposiveness is within matter, or external to it. In other words, Vitalism is concerned with whether or not there is a special kind of teleology in the realm of organic life. Dynamic teleology, as opposed to descriptive (or static) teleology, which is only teleological in the sense of having order, instead posits that the purposiveness of the processes in matter is internal. Evolutionists are, by their very nature, proponents of static teleology. In Aristotle, the term dynamis is not used in the exact sense of the way the term “potentiality” is used today. All believers in epigenesis, Driesch notes, are vitalists. In his Historie Naturelle , George Louis Leclerc Buffon presents a theory that at once makes him a Vitalist and a believer in Darwin’s theory of pangenesis. Buffon notes that not all of the future grains of a seed are contained within one particular grain. Caspar Friedrich Wolf, 1733-1794, constructs a peculiar vital force, which he names vis essentialis, in which the force is endowed with the qualities corresponding to the work that it was required to do. Wolf saw this vital force especially important regarding the directing of epigenesis. With Wolf and Blumenbach, biology changes into a distinct science from its parent, philosophy. By their contributions, biology is released from the grip of Aristotle. Blumenbach was a pronounced Vitalist. Driesch notes that Kant was not consistent in his distinction between static and dynamic teleology, as it seems that concerning humanity and its actions, Kant was a vitalist. Driesch notes that mechanism can only explicate the individual details, but never their relation to the whole. In his Manual of Human Physiology, Johnanes Müller systematically sums up dogmatic vitalism for the last time. Four circumstances determined the character of thought about nature in the later half of the nineteenth century. First, the rise of a materialistic metaphysic in opposition to the idealist philosophy. Second, Darwinism explained how gradual accumulation of change could evoke massive change with time. Third, the discovery of the law of Conservation of Energy by Robert Mayer enraptured the natural sciences. Fourth, with particular importance to Biology, the advent of higher quality optical instruments allowed for circumspect analysis and investigation of delicate structures. Teleology is not the antithesis of causality, but is subordinate to it, claims Driesch. In fact, one can make the assertion that final causality in truth becomes efficient causality when the results are caused by keeping the end in view. NOTE THAT THIS MAY BE IMPORTANT FOR ME IN THE FUTURE WHEN I ATTEMPT TO BRIDGE FINAL CAUSATION WITH KENOSIS. Gustav Wolff, in his critique of Darwinism in 1890, was sure that the fall of Darwinism would lead to a revival of teleology. Wolff saw the issue as being strictly between Darwinism or teleology, one or the other. BUT I DO NOT SEE THE ISSUE THIS CUT AND DRY. Note that Entelechy only allows that to become real which it has within itself already in mere potentiality.