Evolution and revelation / by J.A. Fleming.

  • John Ambrose Fleming
Date:
[between 1900 and 1999]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Evolution and revelation / by J.A. Fleming. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    enough back in time we should arrive at events which were not the mere physical or natural consequences of a previously existing state, but that there was a discontinuity due to operations by a self-conscious Power quite independent of the Universe of things. In opposition to this view, the opimion has not un- commonly been held that the physical Universe never had a beginning, or, at any rate, that we cannot ascertain its origin beyond attributing it, in Herbert Spencer’s phrase, to some Unknowable First Cause, or that, in any case, it 1s, philosophic- ally speaking, not more difficult to admit an uncreated infinite past duration for the Universe of things than to admit it for a Creator. The question really is: Are we to look for the Final Cause of all things to a Thought in a Mind not our own, or to a self-ordering quality in that external Universe which is the cause of thought in our minds? There are, however, some arguments which can be presented in support of the opinion that there must have been a beginning, or even many beginnings, to the physical Universe, in the sense that events then took place which were not the result of physical or biological agencies now in operation but to some Cause entirely different. Our examination of this physical Universe has led us to see that there are apparently four actualities corresponding to four fundamental concepts in our own minds, which a more searching analysis has reduced perhaps to two. These four are Matter, Energy, Space, Time. Without attempting to give definitions which shall satisfy a critical philosophy, we can for present pur- poses define Matter as the permanent source of our sensations, or perceptions ; we can feel it, see it, smell it, etc. All changes in Matter involve something called Energy. Thus, if a mass of matter is set in motion, whether as a whole or by vibration of its atoms, we have to bestow energy to it. All phenomena in Nature involve changes in the form of energy, and all transforma- tions of energy take place by exact numerical equivalents. We have learnt by experience that we can neither create nor destroy Energy or Matter. Hence they are said to be conserved, and the conservation of Energy and of Matter are the fundamental laws of physics and chemistry. Nevertheless, all energy is not in a form in which it is available for further transforma- tions. At each transformation some energy passes into the form of diffused low-temperature heat, and is then non-available. This principle was called by Lord Kelvin the mapa of Knergy.
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