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A New Critique of Theoretical Thought. Deel 3. The Structures of Individuality of Temporal Reality (1969)

A New Critique of Theoretical Thought. Deel 3. The Structures of Individuality of Temporal Reality

(1969)–H. Dooyeweerd–rechtenstatus Auteursrechtelijk beschermd

Vorige Volgende

Part III
Introduction to the theory of the enkaptic interstructural interlacements

Chapter I
The forms of enkaptic interlacement of thing-structures

§ 1 - The inter-structural interlacement and the limits of the cosmological idea of individual totality.

When engaging in an inquiry into the individuality-structures of our experiential horizon we began with abstracting them as much as possible from the enkaptical inter-structural interlacements. This appeared to be methodically necessary to get a theoretical insight into their inner nature. Yet it appeared that we were continually confronted with complicated structures that did not permit a provisional abstraction from the inter-weavings which turned out to be constitutive for themselves. As a general rule we could establish that no single structure of individuality can be realized but in inter-structural intertwinements with other individuality-structures. Guided by our cosmonomic Idea we started from the internal sphere-sovereignty and the mutual irreducibility of the structural types. The cosmological basic principle of sphere-sovereignty first proved to be a fertile idea in the general theory of the modal law-spheres, and it appeared to be equally applicable to the theory of the individuality-structures.

Sphere-sovereignty of modal aspects can only reveal itself within the inter-modal temporal meaning-coherence, and a similar restriction applies to the sphere-sovereignty of structural types of individuality. These types are arranged in an inter-structural enkaptic coherence frustrating any attempt to absolutize them.

The idea of the ‘universe’ in its universalistic conception. Plato's idea of the relation between micro-, meso- and macro-cosmos.

In tracing this inter-structural coherence the fundamental question arises whether it can be conceived as a final individu-

ality structure embracing all temporal things, occurences, actions and societal relations as a ‘universe’. Or does the individuality-structure remain bound to a diversity which is not enclosed in a temporal individual totality? The dilemma ‘universalism’ versus ‘individualism’ presents itself again, but in a much wider cosmological perspective than in the theory of the societal structures.

Plato's picture of the world is a universalistic answer to the above-mentioned question. He conceived of the ‘universe’ as a macrocosm or totality-structure also embracing man as a microcosm. In this speculative thought1 the macrocosm was conceived as an animate being on the analogy of man, and the ‘world-soul’ keeping the universe together, as a totality on the analogy of the human soul2. This view of the macrocosm admirably fits in with the metaphysical organological conception which tries to conceive the mutual relation between things or societal structures in the metaphysical scheme of the whole and its parts. Its prototype was the Idea of a living being, an autozooion.

Plato's Timaeus elaborates this theme in a splendid way and it was already closely connected with the idealistic view of the State of his Politeia. In this latter dialogue Plato construes his ideal State as a connecting link between man as the microcosm and the universe as the macrocosm. This State is the mesocosm embracing all other societal relations as its component parts and arranging them according to the Idea of justice in its concentric relation to the Idea of goodness: Every part should keep to its own social task and thus contribute to the harmony of the whole. The ideal State as the mesocosm thus reflects both the order of the microcosm and that of the universe. This universe, formed after the pattern of the Idea of the αὐτοζῷον, embracing all living beings, has been ordered into a totality by the world-soul, in which the ‘world-reason’ forms the leading part. It embraces all temporal structures, inclusive of the State, as its component parts.

This conception was a metaphysical view, very far exceeding the conception of a universe generally accepted under the influence of the mechanistic Humanist science-ideal. Plato's idea of the macro-cosm attempted to embrace the complete mean-

ing-diversity of the temporal world in a totality which was conceived as a metaphysical being.

The individualistic conception of the idea of the universe. Kant's cosmological idea of the world.

The fundamental difference between this Platonic conception of the universe and that of the modern mechanistic Humanist science-ideal may be strikingly shown by confronting the former with Kant's cosmological idea of the world.

Kant cannot theoretically conceive of the universe in any other way than from a functionalistic mechanical standpoint. But rejecting the metaphysical substance-concept of the Humanistic science-ideal, he also rejects the metaphysical hypostasis of the idea of the universe. In ‘experience’ (i.e. the sensory experience of ‘nature’), in which only phenomena can be known, the cosmos is not given as a totality. Thus in Kant the universe evaporates into a theoretical limiting concept of reason pointing thought only to the totality of transcendental conditions of the experience of the ‘outer world’. This idea is not related to the individuality-structures of reality but to the classical natural scientific concept of function. Insofar as Kant's cosmological idea of the world is oriented to the cognitive ideal of natural science, it is of an evident individualistic character. This cognitive ideal does not start from the universe as a totality but from the elementary functional relations of physical interaction.

According to Kant's epistemology, mathematical natural scientific thought finds a limiting or marginal concept of ‘reason’ in the idea of the universe, but not a datum of experience. As a cognitive idea the universe has been mechanized, robbed of its ‘soul’, of its ‘spirit’; it has become a merely theoretical system of mathematical physical cognitive relations which can never be shut off. Thus the universalistic metaphysical and the individualistic mechanical conceptions of the macrocosm are sharply opposed. The former always opposes a functionalistic mechanical view of the macrocosm, and always considers the universe within the limits of the immanence-standpoint as an animate and spiritualized totality. This view is only possible with the aid of a metaphysical concept of substance1.

The individualistic conception is always determined to con-

strue the universe functionalistically from physical relations. Insofar as any rationalistic metaphysics of the mathematical science-ideal1 is rejected, the totality of the cosmos must evaporate to a subjective limiting concept.

The universe as the interwoven coherence of individuality-structures.

On the Christian transcendence-standpoint this dilemma of universalism versus individualism must be rejected with respect to the conception of the universe as certainly as with respect to the theory of human societal structures. In the light of our cosmonomic Idea there can be no question of a view of the universe as a metaphysical totality displaying the individuality-structure of a ‘living being’. No more can a mechanical conception of the universe be accepted in the sense of a theoretical cognitive ideal identifying the whole of empirical reality with a natural scientific system of physical causal relations.

The meaning-totality of individuality is not to be found in the coherence of the temporal order2. Within this coherence individuality is bound to a structural diversity which lacks any integration into an all-inclusive whole. The metaphysical speculative view of the universe as a cosmic total being or total relationship embracing all other structures as its component parts must be unconditionally rejected. The divine Revelation in Scripture concerning creation contains no indication of any basis for this speculative conception of immanence-philosophy, which tries to transcend the temporal horizon of human experience. The earth and all the other heavenly bodies have been created in systems of physico-chemically qualified individuality-structures. Natural science is able to disclose them in a theoretical sense, but is not entitled to level them by means of an absolutized, merely functional view3. They cannot be construed from a functionalistic hypothesis of their origin after the manner of the theory of Kant-Laplace. Neither can they be conceived as somato-spiritual individual ‘Ueberwesen’ (super-beings) with man

functioning merely as a ‘part of the earth’ according to his body and mind, in the sense intended by G.Th. Fechner1.

They are not shut off in the physico-chemical aspect of reality, but function within their structural type in principle in all the modal law-spheres. They are not entirely apart from the temporal structure of human existence, and do not possess a supra-temporal root of their own, distinct from that of mankind. And they

have been created in a universal order of interweaving coherence with all the other individuality structures.

But this universal order of interlacing coherence of all the temporal individuality-structures that we call cosmos or ‘ordered universe’, cannot itself be contained in an all-embracing individuality structure. For an individuality-structure bears the character of a type and a structural type pre-supposes a diversity of types. The temporal cosmos, however, is the order of coherence which embraces all structural typicality and is the condition of its possibility. The speculative conception holds that this cosmos is only one of the many that are possible. No wonder that here the cosmic order of inter-structural coherence is supposed to be conceivable as an individuality-structure in its metaphysical misinterpretation. Whoever has seen that the transcendental idea of possibility is entirely determined by the cosmic world-order1 cannot relapse into such uncritical speculations. The cosmological idea of temporal individuality-structure remains fundamentally limited by the structural diversity. The idea of meaning-modality points above itself to the temporal coherence of all the modal spheres and to the fulness of meaning in the transcendent religious root and to the Origin of the creation. In a similar way the idea of individuality-structure points to that which embraces all such structures and to the religious root and the Origin of all individuality.

The meaning-character of the universal interwoven coherence within the plastic horizon and the reflection of this coherence within the separate individuality-structures.

The analysis of these structures in their expression within the different modal functions has revealed that each of these structures is internally non-self-sufficient. Already the first structural type discussed in Vol. III, Part I, viz. that of a linden tree, proved to be incapable of complete isolation and could not be conceived in itself as an independent substance.

The qualification of the internal metabolic processes in the tree as bio-chemical processes appeals to the cosmic coherence between the tree and its environment (‘Umwelt’). Outside of this inter-structural coherence the metabolic functions are impossible. The insight into this inter-structural coherence is

deepened when the micro-structures are taken into account in which the macro-things are founded. The tree's structure seems at first to be simple, but on deeper theoretical analysis it proves to be highly complex because this structure appears to be possible only in the universal inter-structural coherence. The complicated structural interlacements revealed in the natural scientific view of the tree are multiplied when the objective normative functions of the latter are considered. Here this natural thing proves to be included in an extremely complex inter-wovenness with the structures of temporal human society.

Thus it becomes clear that the universal inter-structural coherence of the cosmos reflects itself in the pheno-typical individuality-structure of this thing. The inter-structural interlacements prove to be fundamentally incapable of isolation. According to its transcendental limiting function the tree is a qualified object of faith, which integrates its individuality-structure into the whole cosmic interwoven coherence. Only in this coherence is the structure possible and a real datum centring in the religious root of human existence. And the transcendent root of human existence is only really concentrated in Christ, because in Him alone it is directed to the true Origin of all things, the Creator of heaven and earth. Thus the meaning-character of created reality maintains itself in an inexhaustible abundance within the plastic horizon of the individuality-structures.

The interwoven coherence of the individuality-structures and the teleological order of the Aristotelian ‘essential forms’.

The temporal order of interlacement of all the individuality-structures cannot at all be conceived in the uniform metaphysical scheme of a teleological world-plan. The idea of a teleological world-order is of Greek origin though Christian scholasticism has accommodated it to the Biblical conception of God's providence. This teleological conception of the cosmos first appeared in Greek thought when the form-motive of the cultural religion acquired primacy in the philosophy of nature.

In the fifth century B.C. it is Diogenes of Apolonia who applies Anaxagoras' basic idea of a teleological world-plan to the interpretation of particular natural phenomena. It is very probable that Socrates' idea of a teleological world-order, as it is handed down to us both by Xenophon's Memorabilia and Plato's Philebus, was immediately influenced by Anaxagoras and Diogenes.

And via Socrates it became the foundation of the so-called physico-teleological proof of the existence of God as it is found in Plato and Aristotle. In general it implied a technical-cultural view of nature. This completely suited to the Greek conception of God as the Demiurg, the divine Architect, who moulds ‘matter’ after a free project or technical plan.

The teleological order of the Aristotelian essential forms in the scheme of superior and inferior, form and matter, end (telos) and means, seems to construe the plastic horizon of experiential reality as an extremely transparant and rational structural totality. But it remains a speculative construction whose simplistic schemes do not correspond to the real extremely complicated states of affairs. When applied to the relations between the individuality-structures, this scheme necessarily leads to a universalistic conception of the temporal cosmos. In reality the cosmic order of inter-structural interweavings, as it reveals itself in the plastic dimension of our experiental horizon, does not display a uniform schematism. But there are different types of ordering to be discovered in these interlacements, which show a rich variety and defy any a-priori speculative construction. It is this variety of types of ordering which requires a more detailed investigation.

§ 2 - The character of enkapsis in contrast to the relation of the whole and its parts.

The meaning of the term enkapsis in Haering and Heidenhain.

From the very beginning we have introduced the term ‘enkapsis’ to denote the intertwinement of individuality-structures of a different radical-typical or geno-typical character. This terminology requires an explanation since it is used by us in a sense quite different from that attributed to it by those who first introduced it into science and philosophy.

The term ‘enkapsis’ was borrowed from the famous anatomist Heidenhain by Theodor Haering, who gave it a general philosophical meaning. Heidenhain used the term ‘enkapsis’ or ‘incapsulation’ to denote the relation between the separate organs and the total organism in the structure of a living creature. His scientific investigations had taught him that the organs of a living body such as the kidneys, the lungs, etc. are not simply ‘parts’ of this body in the usual sense of dependent components, but that they are relatively independent individuals. Their growth proves

to be a continuous self-propagation, a continuous self-division. On the other hand the total organism reveals itself as an individual whole of relatively independent individualities. Notwithstanding the relative autonomy of these latter it displays a perfectly independent internal unity which lives and works, so to say, in all the individual component parts. For instance, Heidenhain says about the structure of a muscle: ‘In a muscle a number of histo-systems of different orders of magnitude are arranged one on top of the other, or to say it in other words, they are shoved into one another (enkapsis): the fibrils, the little columns, the muscle fibres, the flesh fibres, and finally the macroscopic muscle’.1

This term ‘enkapsis’ introduced by Heidenhain is used by Haering promiscuously with ‘Funktionseinheit’ (functional unity) or ‘Ganzes mit Gliedern’ (a whole and its members). Haering supposes he has discovered a general scheme for the unity of individuality in the structural thought denoted by these, terms. He defines this scheme as follows: ‘Just as the parts do not exist without the whole notwithstanding their relative individual independence, or would at least be different outside of the whole, so, inversely, the whole is not without the parts, but it is at the same time something different, something “new” as compared with the parts. The whole is not at all merely the sum total of its parts, nor a merely external formation of a plurality of parts moulded into some form, but a real qualitative new unity’2. He tries to apply this scheme to other ‘divisions of biology’ and to the physico-chemical micro-structures as well as to the ‘purely psychical’ realm, i.e. the ‘psyche’ as ‘ichhafte Funktionseinheit’ (the functional unity of the I-ness). And finally he applies it to the psycho-physical and the ‘spiritual’-psycho-physical individuality.

Why the term is unserviceable in this meaning.

This conception of the structure of individuality is oriented to a constructive trichotomic schema of physis, psyche and spirit,

rather than to the plastic horizon of experience. The application of this scheme of the unity of individuality to the domain of the ‘purely psychical’ functions proves that this view has nothing to do with our conception of individuality structure. But apart from all these considerations, it should be observed that the term ‘enkapsis’ is exclusively used here to denote the immanent relation between the whole of the individuality structure and its parts, although the relative independence of the latter is recognized.

This term, however, is not really appropriate to denote this relation, and had better be replaced by Haertng's own term ‘unity of individuality’. In my opinion the term ‘enkapsis’ expresses much rather an interwovenness of individuality-structures that cannot at all be qualified as the relation of a whole and its parts. By this term Heidenhain wished to denote that the organs are relatively independent individuals in the body, consequently more than ‘parts’ in the usual sense. But he could not sufficiently distinguish the figure of enkapsis from the relation between the whole and its parts for lack of sufficient insight into the individuality-structure of a thing. Especially the qualifying rôle of the leading function in this structure was not clear to him.

The relative autonomy of the organs within the total organism does not mean that they have a natural leading function of their own; for their natural internal distinction is dependent on the leading function of the total organism. Haering observes: ‘Even if one succeeds in keeping a single organ artificially alive outside of the total organism for some length of time, or if one should succeed in cultivating it entirely artificially (which up to now has not been possible), this organ would be something fundamentally different from what it is as a member in the whole organism, and not really identical with it’1.

But the question as to whether, e.g., an animal organ is an independent ‘thing’, cannot be answered experimentally without the foundation of an idea of individuality-structures. This

point will be considered later on in connection with the experiments in which groups of cells are transplanted or inserted, and with the experiments to cultivate cells of a specific organ or tissue outside of the living total organism. For the present it will suffice to say that an animal organ does not have the natural destination to live apart from the total organism.

The question is not whether, e.g., an organic part artificially kept alive outside of the total organism for a certain length of time, is different from what it is in its natural function within the whole. But the question is whether such a part reveals an independent individuality-structure, or remains merely an animal organ even in its abnormal condition of an artificially led life. Morbid growth of an organ functioning within the animal body also makes this part different from what it was when in a healthy condition. But such a change does not destroy its structural identity. The fact that in its artificial isolation an organ continues to propagate itself in its process of growth is no sufficient reason to call it an independent thing. This fact only proves its relative autonomy but not its sovereignty within its own sphere, not its independent internal destination. A part may have a relatively autonomous internal sphere of life within the whole, its internal destination as an organic member may leave free scope to this autonomy so that for a short time an organ may even be artificially kept alive outside of the total organism. But this abnormal condition cannot alter its inner nature determined by its natural destination as a part of the whole.

The relation between the whole and its parts within the individuality-structures never has an enkaptic character. Some types of this relation.

A genuine enkaptic structural interlacement, taken in our sense, pre-supposes that the structures of things and events, or those of societal relationships functioning in it, have an independent internal leading function and an internal structural principle of their own.

It is essential to gain an insight into this state of affairs. Therefore a comparison with the relation of the whole and its parts within the separate individuality-structures will be instructive. In the present context we shall restrict ourselves to considering this relation as it presents itself in the thing-structures. Provisionally we leave out of account the fact that, generally speaking, the latter have proved to include enkaptical interlacements be-

tween individuality-structures of a more simple character. The complicated structure of what we have called an ‘enkaptic whole’ cannot be understood before we have gained a sufficient insight into the different types of enkapsis. In any case an ‘enkaptic whole’ cannot derive its character as a whole from the inter-structural intertwinements which it includes.

Every complete individual thing as an individual totality has its parts, and the relation between the individual totality and its parts, as such, is always determined by the internal structural principle of the whole. Two different types of this relation have already been discussed in the first part of this volume, viz. that of the internal homogeneity of the parts in a homogeneous aggregate, and that of the internal heterogeneity of the parts in a non-homogeneous total structure1. All the biotically and psychically qualified natural beings, and also the usable objects founded in a technical form, display a non-homogeneous structure. The same thing holds for objective works of art realized in a thing-structure. But the enkaptic structural interlacements between things as such never constitute a relation of the whole and its parts.

The relation between a part and an enkaptic function. The modal functions of a thing are not its parts.

The marble of the ‘Hermes of Praxiteles’ is a physico-chemically qualified aggregate of calc-spar crystals and, as such, no part of the work of art proper. It is merely enkaptically bound in the latter through an inter-structural interlacement; it only functions in this sculpture and its parts. For the same reason it is not permissible to say that the physico-chemically qualified molecules, as such, are parts of the living organism of the cell. They lack the subjective vital function and that is why they only function in an enkaptic union in the living organism. The real parts of the latter are the nucleus and the protoplasm with their numerous organic-structural component parts.

In all those things whose structure is not that of a homogeneous aggregate, a part is essentially qualified by the structure

of the whole. In this case the structure of the whole can never be construed by means of its parts, because the parts, as such, are entirely dependent on the whole. The question what is a part of a non-homogeneous whole cannot be decided by a functional mathematical-physical analysis, but only by an inquiry into the internal individuality-structure of this whole. This fact has always been lost sight of on the functionalistic standpoint.

It should also be borne in mind that the parts of a thing are never to be confounded with its structural functions in the different modal aspects. The physico-chemical functions of a cell are no doubt bound to the molecules of the different kinds of its constitutive matter, but these functions are no living parts of a cell. The parts of a living cell-organism may have relative autonomy within the whole, but just as the ‘organs’ in the body of a poly-cellular animal or of a human being, they do not possess sovereignty within their own sphere as parts. Only in a real enkapsis does the internal sphere-sovereignty of the individuality-structures become manifest. If a thing with a particular individuality-structure functions enkaptically in a thing with a different structure, this enkaptic interlacement always means a binding of the first structure. That is to say the first thing exceeds the boundaries of its internal structural principle in this enkaptic function within another thing. This enkaptic function is not regulated by the thing's own structural law, but by the law of the thing in which the first thing functions enkaptically.

Thus this enkapsis leaves the internal sphere-sovereignty of the bound individuality-structure intact. In other words, the enkaptically interwoven thing with an independent individuality structure of its own is influenced by this union with another thing only in such a way that the interwoven thing maintains its internal structural law. In the first part of this volume we have explained that in this enkaptical binding the internal structural principle of the interwoven thing displays variability-types whose basis is no longer to be found in its geno-type. Thus the inter-structural relation of enkapsis reveals its fundamental difference from the internal structural relation between the whole and its parts in all respects.

§ 3 - The different types of ordering in the enkaptical interlacements between thing-structures.

The irreversible enkaptic foundational relation.

As observed, the enkaptic interlacements between the individuality-structures cannot be forced into such a uniform a-priori pattern as the Aristotelian form-matter scheme. They display different types of ordering. When discussing these types, we should always bear in mind that the structural a-priori of the temporal horizon of empirical reality must never be identified with a subjective a-priori of our theoretical knowledge. The true individuality-structures and their mutual interlacements can only be detected in our orientation to the integral experiential reality. This subjective investigation, however, remains bound to the guidance of the transcendental structural Idea as the necessary subjective a priori of theoretical thought.

Our analysis of the structural principle of a sculpture and of various usable objects was already confronted with a particular type of enkaptical intertwinement1. It appeared that, e.g., the natural structure of marble is enkaptically bound in the individuality-structure of a sculpture in such a way that there is an irreversible foundational relation between these two structures. The marble may function freely in its natural physico-chemically qualified structure, but the marble ‘Hermes’, in its structure as an artistic object, is indissolubly bound to the structure of the marble. Its structure is irreversibly founded in the latter. In this enkaptic type of ordering a genuine relation of form and material appeared to be discernible, although not in the sense of the Aristotelian form-matter scheme. For the technical form itself proved to play the rôle of a foundational function in the individuality structure of the object of art. The qualifying function could only be found in the objectified depiction of the aesthetical conception of the god's figure which appeared not at all to be identical with the technical form. Although this type of ordering implies a one-sided and irreversible foundational relation, the enkaptic union in the structure of the artistic object is not indifferent to the natural individuality-structure of the marble as a homogeneous aggregate of calc-spar crystals. For we have seen that in this union the marble begins to display an opening and deepening of its structure2, turning it into an aesthetically expressive material in the structure of the object

of art. Within the structure of the ‘Hermes’ the marble cannot function as a free natural product. In this inter-structural enkapsis the internal nature of the marble has not been destroyed, but it has been opened by the aesthetical-technical formation in a typical way. As a result the physico-chemical functions of the marble not only leave the internal aesthetical harmony undisturbed, but they are rendered entirely subservient to the aesthetical expression in the visible macro-image.

In this enkaptic opening the marble material assumes a variability type and, conversely, it gives the object of art a variability type.

The enkaptic foundational relation between molecule and cell.

The enkaptic type of ordering found in the inter-structural interlacement of marble and an object of art, generally occurs in the intertwinement of micro-things of different radical- or geno-types and of micro- and macro-structures of ‘natural things’ differing in radical type or geno-type. We have already pointed out the interlacement of physico-chemically qualified atoms and molecules with the living cell-organism. The atoms and molecules, as such, appeared not to be parts of a living cell-organism, but to be enkaptically bound within the structure of the latter1.

That this view can really account for the empirical facts established by scientific research will appear from our investigation of the complicated structure of an enkaptical whole in the third chapter. The question as to what are the real parts of a living cell-organism is decided by its internal structure, which has assigned different functions to nucleus and plasm within the living whole. In these two parts of a cell-organism, each containing quite a number of organic subordinate parts2, the atoms are enkaptically bound in a molecular union, but retain their own inner nature and internal sphere-sovereignty. Also in this inter-structural interlacement we discover the typical irrever-

sible foundational relation together with the typical opening1 of the bound structure by that of the cell-organism, in which it enkaptically functions.

Not before the process of dissolution starts do the atoms united to molecules regain their freedom, and thereby they lose their typical opening by the vital leading function. The internal organic chemical processes of assimilation and dissimilation display an undeniable direction, and insofar an anticipatory character. The resulting chemical combinations formed in this process of a small number of elements (chiefly C, H, O, N.) have for the most part an extremely complicated structure unknown in inorganic chemistry. And what is especially striking is that these combinations in their phenotypes are determined by the individuality-structure of the organism. It is a well-known fact that each type of ‘organism’ produces its own variability-type of chemical combinations, in particular its own type of albumen. The organic catalyzers, the so-called enzymes2 or ferments operate according to typical organic, surprisingly rapid procedures quite different from those applied in the laboratory, when organic chemical combinations are synthetically copied3.

And in a suitable manner and place these enzymes are secreted by the healthy organism in accordance with the vital needs of the whole. The atoms and molecules cannot display this individuality-structure in their own internal physico-chemically qualified micro-structure4. The latter remains something ex-

ternal in comparison with the former1, although the two structures are enkaptically united.

This in itself is not yet contrary to recent biological views according to which ‘life’ reveals itself in a solidary activity permeating the ‘living mass’ to its minutest biotically qualified particles. Nevertheless this view may imply the tendency to level out the boundaries between the living organism as a structural whole and the different molecular structures of matter in which the former is enkaptically founded. This is evident from the emphasis which different adherents of this modern vision lay on the assertion that the cell is not the real bearer of life, but that it is much rather the ‘living mass’ in its finest and most delicate structures2. We shall see in the third chapter that this assertion is not sufficiently warranted by the experiential facts.

The provisionally quite hypothetical ‘protomeries’ (i.e., ultimate particles) of a ‘living mass’ are conceived after the pattern of material molecules. They are often called ‘bio-molecules’ (Verworn, Woltereck). But the very question is whether ‘life’ can manifest itself within the internal molecular structures of matter. If so, we are obliged to assume that such structures may display an autonomous biotical qualification. In my opinion this assumption is meaningless and I shall account for this view in the third chapter.

Are organisms micro-physical systems? The theory of Jordan.

The distinction between the enkaptic function and the internal structure of molecules is of fundamental importance for biology in the recent controversy about P. Jordan's theory according to which the organisms are essentially micro-physical systems1.

Jordan considers the reactions forming the basis of the most important vital processes to be processes peculiar to the atomic order of magnitude. The latter, which can only be statistically approached, are supposed to direct the reactions manifesting themselves in the macroscopic world. The result is that, in contrast with inorganic macro-processes, these reactions proceed ‘a-causally’.

To my mind this theory implies a biologizing of the internal atomic structures of matter enkaptically bound in the living organism, rather than a physicalizing of the vital processes. Jordan realizes that the laws of quantum mechanics that he tries to apply to biology in the same way as Bohr did, cannot form a sufficient basis for this ‘Verstärker-theorie’ (theory of intensification). For these laws also apply to the atoms of inorganic macro-physical systems, while the latter exhibit an undoubted a-biotic causal character. Thus I suppose Jordan's theory stands and falls with the premise that the internal atomic and molecular structures of the different kinds of matter which function in enkaptical binding within a living organism, has a typical biotic qualification. This assumption is not justified in my opinion. Therefore I think Jordan's views have been rightly attacked by various critics.

The theory of the enkaptical interlacements of structures can bring clarity in this debate, if we recognize that the enkaptic physico-chemical function of the atoms and molecules in a living cell-organism is determined by the structure of this living whole. This physico-chemical function bears an opened macro-physical character and is biotically qualified. The internal

micro-physical structure, on the contrary, retains its physico-chemical qualification.

The qualifying function of a cell of a poly-cellular non-human body depends on the structure of the whole body.

In the light of our theory of the individuality-structures of temporal reality it is, however, no longer possible to speak of a cell in general. This word denotes an undefined general concept which, as such, says nothing of the individuality-structure of the living unit in question. The germ-cell of all higher poly-cellular organisms develops by means of continuous partition into a being of a pre-determined structural type, as the result of a sexual or non-sexual process of propagation. This individuality-structure is that of a plant, or an animal; only the human germ-cell lacks a radical-typical limitation and refers to the mystery of the spiritual centre of human existence, which transcends all temporal structures. In other words, the qualifying function of a non-human germ-cell is entirely dependent on the individuality-structure of the being destined to develop from it genetically. Only the germ-cell of a plant is biotically qualified according to its radical type1.

According to its structural type the germ-cell of poly-cellular creatures is not destined to lead an atomistic separate existence. This cell is qualified by the total structure of the more or less differentiated body whose entire architecture is implied in it as a pre-disposition, but certainly not in the mechanical sense of a ‘pre-formation’1. Our observations on the inner nature of the germ-cell of a poly-cellular being hold with even greater emphasis for the soma-cells developing from it. The soma-cells display a structure differentiated in accordance with the organ in which they function within the totality. The relation of the living cell-body to the poly-cellular part and the total body can thus never be identified with that of an inter-structural enkaptic interlacement, but is the relation between a part and its whole.

Structurally the whole is before the parts, but not in the sense of the enkaptic foundational relation that we discovered between molecules and a living cell-organism.

The experiments made in connection with the transplantation and implantation of groups of cells, and in connection with the cultivation of free cell-cultures outside of the living organism.

Against our view it would be possible to adduce the important modern experiments made in connection with the transplantation and implantation of groups of cells, and especially the experiments with the cultivation of free cell-groups (e.g., of connective tissue) outside of the living organism. These cultures exhibit essentially different qualities from those which they display within the living organism in which they form a unified whole with other groups of cells1. The mechanistic tendency in biology looks upon such experiments as another confirmation of the sole validity of the deterministic causal-physical view of the biotic developmental phenomena. But - apart from the fact that the mechanistic theory simply ignores the real structural problem implied in these experiments2 - these phenomena do not prove that the separate cells possess an independent natural inner destination different from that of the total organism. In all these experiments we are confronted with an aberration due to an external cause purposely directed by theoretical research; or with a case of degeneration, no doubt proceeding in conformity with a strict functional law, but structurally only to be qualified as deformations, morbid phenomena or abnormalities3.
Symptoms of organic disease such as sarcoma, and goiter, do not prove the existence of an independent natural leading function of the affected parts within the organism. The modal, causal-functional coherence of the vital phenomena within the physico-chemical law-sphere is not annihilated by the internal structural law of the individuality-structures functioning in this aspect. These individuality-structures cannot even exist without the modal aspects.
This means that our theory of the individuality-structures and their enkaptic interlacements does not render superfluous the biologist's investigations of the causal-functional coherence of the vital phenomena in their physico-chemical aspect. When he orients his researches to this theory he is much rather stimulated to carry on this causal-functional inquiry with the greatest possible energy and devotion. But it will warn him against a functionalistic eradication both of the modal boundaries of the law-spheres and of the individuality-structures. He will discover the harmonious coherence between the modal functional and the structural-typical view of life phenomena in all normal vital processes.
For this harmonious coherence has not been revealed by Driesch's neo-vitalism, nor by Meyer's and Haldane's modern holism.
Both views start from an erroneous idea of the cosmic meaning-coherence1.

Enkaptic symbiosis and the correlative enkapsis between creatures with a subjective vital function and their environment (‘Umwelt’).

We find a type of ordering quite different from the enkaptic foundational relation discussed above, in certain inter-structural interlacements which in their biological aspect form the field of research of ‘ecology’ (in a wider sense). We first refer to the interlacement between a living being and its environment (Umwelt) within a particular radical type. In a certain sense this interlacement seems to display a foundational relation insofar as a plant or animal, as such, cannot live without the substratum of external physical and chemical ‘conditions’, such as light, air, temperature, and so on.

But we can only speak of an ‘Umwelt’ (environment) in connection with a living organism. In this enkaptic interwovenness the environment exhibits an objective biotic or objective psychic qualifying function, only opened as such by the subjective structure of the living organism. In this sense this structural function has a dependent character.

No ‘Umwelt’ exists apart from the vegetable and animal kingdoms. The enkaptic interlacements here intended, in which the individual displays its pheno-typical variability, bears a distinctly correlative character in the sense of a relation of mutual interdependence in a different respect. The type of ordering in such a correlative enkapsis is entirely different from that of symbiosis, which differentiates itself in the most widely diverging sub-types, and at the same time remains interwoven with the correlative enkapsis between living being and ‘Umwelt’. Symbiosis shows typical forms of interlacement between individuality-structures both of the same and of a different radical type, but in any case of a different geno-typical character.

There is first the coherence between an individual and a collective whole. It occurs in all those animal and vegetative forms of symbiosis in which, in accordance with its natural destination, the individual retains a truly independent sphere of existence outside of the collective unit within which it functions as

a part of the whole1. Among these there are also typical border-line cases in the so-called animal colonies or ‘Tierstöcke’, which have been found in particular groups of coelenterates, especially coral zoophytes and synphonophora (jellyfish). Perhaps the synphonophora are the most interesting of them, because numerous clearly differentiated types of polyps are bodily united into a freely moving total body, although from time to time particular polyps detach themselves from the rest and live apart as ‘medusas’ for a certain time and propagate. In this case, too, we must speak of an enkaptic symbiosis besides the relation between a part and the whole.

This type of enkaptic symbiosis is also found with the volvox and the spongiae, which form colonies of cells. Parasitic symbiosis occurs, e.g., between animals and plants. This is an example of symbiotic enkapsis of individuality-structures possessing a different radical type (e.g., between gall-wasps and oaks, etc.). But this parasitic type of symbiotic enkapsis is also found between animals or plants of different geno-type, and between particular kinds of virus and plants or animals. This does certainly not agree with the teleological Aristotelian scheme of form and matter.

Typical collective structures of enkaptic symbiosis.

A special collective type of enkaptic symbiosis is found in the relation between the collective total structure of a forest, heath, meadow, steppe, etc. and the widely different plants and animals living in them. These collectivities are undoubted examples of structural totalities of a vegetative (biotic) qualification which are statically bound to a larger or smaller area.

Within these collective structures we find the relation of the whole to its parts which is entirely determined by the total structure. But not all vegetation found in these collectivities can be qualified as parts of the whole. A pine forest is only qualified as a dense vegetation of pinetrees, a heath as a dense vegetation of heather, etc. Some isolated trees in a heath are, as such, not parts of it, but only show the relation of an enkaptic symbiosis with the vegetation of the heath.

The same thing holds for the fauna bound to these vegetative collectivities in an enkaptic symbiosis.

The individual plants functioning as the variable parts of the whole, within this collective totality retain their own internal structure, which is only interwoven with the collective structure in an enkaptic symbiosis.

Both these collectivities, and each separate individual in them form an enkaptic symbiosis with the ‘Umwelt’. In all these cases we find natural collective centres or nodal points of enkaptic symbiosis (the different kinds of landscape e mbracing fauna and flora) which, as such, should not be confused with structural wholes proper. These collective structures of enkaptic symbiosis are ruled by a law of ‘biotic balance’, i.e. the relative numbers of animals and plants living together in them generally maintain a constant average. But this is no reason to identify the enkaptic interweavings with the structural wholes functioning in them.

The enkaptic character of these relations is proved by the fact that the numbers of the various animals and plants in them fluctuate around a certain average, dependent on the ‘Umwelt’, and especially on temperature and rainfall. They compensate one another only so long as the climatic vital conditions are not fundamentally changed. This means that this regularity is not an internal structural law of the landscape as a supposed vital whole, but remains entirely dependent on the ‘Umwelt’.

The enkaptic subject-object relations between animal or vegetable beings and their formations realized in an objective thing-structure.

Another type of inter-structural interlacement is found in the enkaptic subject-object relations between animal or vegetable beings and their objective formations with which they remain vitally united1.

We cannot call the calc-shells of the molluscs, e.g., genuine parts of the latter's living organisms, because they do not have the same structural principle. The calc-formation in its enkaptic union with the animal organism is of an objective psychic qualification, but the animal has a subjective psychical leading function. The calc-shell may be detached from this enkaptic interlacement. Then its objective qualifying function becomes in-actualized, i.e. rendered in-operative2, although in human

experience it continues to be conceived as an animal formation. This formation may have an essential function in animal life, but such a function cannot be considered a part of the animal organism. Nevertheless, the shell might prove to belong to a real enkaptic whole of a supra-biotic qualification.

The universal interwoven coherence of the thing-structures and the nodal points of these enkaptic interlacements.

Within the realm of the physico-chemically qualified macro-structures there are a whole series of mutually coherent enkaptical interlacements whose counterpart is found in the relations of the whole and its parts (the planets with their satellites, the solar system, spherical groups of stars, the galaxy, and so on). Astronomy has as yet discovered only little with any certainty about their mutual relations and internal nature (especially as regards the more comprehensive systems). The question is whether these interlacements display the type of a one-sided foundational relation, or that of a correlative enkapsis.

The answer depends on another question: In how far is there a genetic connection within a system or between the different systems?1 All the realms of thing-structures, however, are enkaptically interwoven in the plastic horizon, both those of the micro-world and those of the macro-world. In this enkapsis the foundational type as well as the correlative and symbiotic types of enkapsis play a rôle. And in all cases the pheno-typical forms of things reveal themselves as real nodal points of the enkaptic interlacements. All these interlacements are in turn interwoven with those presenting themselves between the structures of temporal human society, insofar as the natural thing-structures and those of cultural formations are related to the temporal societal structures of human life as objects to their subjects.

The enkaptic interlacements of natural things in human societal structures.

We shall consider a mixed farming business to exemplify the enkaptic interlacement between natural things and a human societal

structure, viz. that of cattle rearing combined with agriculture. The fields, pastures, cattle, buildings (with their stock-in-trade) function in this human societal structure, as well as all the usable objects belonging to the farming. The land and the cattle are qualified only as economic objects of the latter as far as their enkaptic function in it is concerned.

The actualizing of the economic function of fields, pastures, and cattle belongs to the internal destination of the farming business, which is, therefore, entirely dependent on this typical subject-object-structure. But the animals functioning as the live-stock of the farm are, as such, i.e. in their own internal structure, certainly not of a typically economic qualification. They are natural beings, according to their inner animal nature bound to the pasture (as a vegetative collectivity) in a symbiotic interlacement, and interwoven in a correlative enkapsis with their ‘Umwelt’. They live in an animal bi-unity when they copulate, and for some time after the birth of the young at least the mother-animal lives in a natural community with the latter.

But these natural structures with their complicated interlacements can, as such, be interwoven with a human industrial relationship only enkaptically and thereby be bound in this structure. Insofar as they are productive objects of a farming-business, animals, pastures, and fields do not function as free, i.e. wild natural beings, or natural collectivities. Their economic function is typically founded in an objective cultural form whose subjective correlate is constituted by the typical foundational function of the industrial relationship as an organized cultural-economic power-formation. In the enkaptic interlacement between the internal natural structure of the above mentioned objects and their structure as an industrial object, we again find the typical order of the one-sided foundational relation, but with mutually bound interwoven individuality-structures. In this enkapsis industrialized natural things display cultural-economic variability types.

The business-organization, binding animals, pastures and fields in their natural structure, is interwoven with a great number of other human societal structures; also the industrial objects are included in these new, extremely complicated enkaptic relations.

This interwoven coherence of human societal structures will now demand our attention.


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