F. C. S. SCHILLER
ness is both humanly unnecessary and scientifically unmeaning. Indeed a degree of accuracy higher than the situation demands would be irrational. No one wants to know the height of a mountain in millimeters, and if he did, he could not ascertain it, because his methods would not measure fine enough. Scientific truths are infinitely perfectible, but never absolute.[1]
Now if philosophers are wise, they will accept this sort of truth, and admit that any truth is "absolute" enough so soon as it is equal to the demands made upon it, while none must ever be so absolute as to become incorrigible and incapable of further growth.
A human factor, an element of personal desire, enters into all our thinking; otherwise why should we bother to think? Even our most abstract and general theorems have a hidden Hinterland of subconscious motives, limitations, and conditions.
The abstract statement that "two and two make four" is always incomplete. We need to know to what "twos" and "fours" the dictum is applied. It would not be true of lions and lambs, nor of drops of water, nor of pleasures and pains.[2]
- ↑ I find the following incident reported of a Boston school which would indicate that the philosophy of William James is influencing the younger generation in his home city:
"Well, Waldo," said the professor of geometry, "can you prove any of to-day's theorems?"
"No, sir, I'm afraid I can't," said Waldo hopefully; "but I can render several of them highly probable." - ↑ "Studies in Humanism."
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