Contents
Volitional acts. Desire, wanting, will are states of consciousness well known to everyone, but not amenable to any definition. We desire to experience, to have, to do all sorts of things that at this moment we do not experience, do not have, do not do. If with the desire for something we have the realization that the object of our desires is unattainable, then we simply desire; if we are sure that the goal of our desires is achievable, then we want it to be realized, and it is carried out either immediately or after we have performed some preliminary actions.
The only goals of our desires, which we realize immediately, immediately, are the movement of our body. Whatever feelings we desire to experience, whatever possessions we strive for, we can only achieve them by making a few preliminary movements for our goal. This fact is too obvious and therefore does not need examples: therefore we can take as the starting point of our study of the will the proposition that the only immediate external manifestations are bodily movements. We now have to consider the mechanism by which volitional movements are performed.
Volitional acts are arbitrary functions of our organism. The movements we have so far considered were of the type of automatic or reflex acts, and, moreover, acts whose significance is not foreseen by the person who performs them (at least the person who performs them for the first time in his life). The movements which we now begin to study, being intentional and knowingly being the object of desire, are, of course, made with full awareness of what they should be. From this it follows that volitional movements represent a derivative, and not the primary function of the organism. This is the first proposition that must be kept in mind in order to understand the psychology of the will. Both the reflex, and the instinctive movement, and the emotional are the primary functions. The nerve centers are so constituted that certain stimuli cause their discharge in certain parts, and the being experiencing such a discharge for the first time experiences a completely new phenomenon of experience.
Once I was on the platform with my young son when an express train rumbled into the station. My boy, who was standing not far from the edge of the platform, was frightened at the noisy appearance of the train, trembled, began to breathe intermittently, turned pale, began to cry, and finally rushed to me and hid his face. I have no doubt that the child was almost as surprised by his own behavior as by the movement of the train, and in any case more surprised by his behavior than I, who was standing beside him. Of course, after we have experienced such a reaction a few times, we ourselves will learn to expect its results and begin to anticipate our behavior in such cases, even if the actions remain as involuntary as before. But if in an act of will we must foresee the action, then it follows that only a being with the gift of foresight can immediately perform an act of will, never making reflex or instinctive movements.
But we do not have the prophetic gift to foresee what movements we can make, just as we cannot predict the sensations that we will experience. We must wait for the unknown sensations to appear; in the same way, we must make a series of involuntary movements in order to find out what the movements of our body will consist of. Possibilities are known to us through actual experience. After we have made some movement by chance, reflex or instinct, and it has left a trace in the memory, we may wish to make this movement again and then we will make it deliberately. But it is impossible to understand how we could wish to make a certain movement without ever having done it before. So, the first condition for the emergence of volitional, voluntary movements is the preliminary accumulation of ideas that remain in our memory after we repeatedly make the movements corresponding to them in an involuntary manner.
Two different kinds of ideas about movement
Ideas about movements are of two kinds: direct and indirect. In other words, either the idea of movement in the moving parts of the body themselves, an idea that we are aware of at the moment of movement, or the idea of the movement of our body, insofar as this movement is visible, heard by us, or insofar as it has a certain effect (blow, pressure, scratching) on some other part of the body.
Direct sensations of movement in moving parts are called kinesthetic, memories of them are called kinesthetic ideas. With the help of kinesthetic ideas, we are aware of the passive movements that the members of our body communicate to each other. If you are lying with your eyes closed, and someone quietly changes the position of your arm or leg, then you are aware of the position given to your limb, and you can then reproduce the movement with the other arm or leg. In the same way, a person who wakes up suddenly at night, lying in darkness, is aware of the position of his body. This is the case, at least in normal cases. But when the sensations of passive movements and all other sensations in the members of our body are lost, then we have a pathological phenomenon described by Strümpell on the example of a boy who retained only visual sensations in the right eye and auditory sensations in the left ear (in: Deutsches Archiv fur Klin. Medicin , XXIII).
“The limbs of the patient could be moved in the most energetic way, without attracting his attention. Only with an exceptionally strong abnormal stretching of the joints, especially the knees, did the patient have an indistinct dull feeling of tension, but even this was rarely localized in an exact way. Often, blindfolding the patient, we carried him around the room, laid him on the table, gave his arms and legs the most fantastic and, apparently, extremely uncomfortable postures, but the patient did not even suspect anything of this. It is difficult to describe the astonishment on his face when, having removed the handkerchief from his eyes, we showed him the position in which his body was brought. Only when his head hung down during the experiment did he begin to complain of dizziness, but he could not explain its cause.
Subsequently, from the sounds associated with some of our manipulations, he sometimes began to guess that we were doing something special on him … The feeling of muscle fatigue was completely unknown to him. When we blindfolded him and asked him to raise his hands and hold them in that position, he did it without difficulty. But after a minute or two his hands began to tremble and, imperceptibly to himself, lowered, and he continued to claim that he was holding them in the same position. Whether his fingers were passively motionless or not, he could not notice. He constantly imagined that he was clenching and unclenching his hand, while in reality it was completely motionless.
There is no reason to suppose the existence of any third kind of motor ideas.
So, in order to make a voluntary movement, we need to call in the mind either a direct (kinesthetic) or mediated idea corresponding to the upcoming movement. Some psychologists have suggested that, moreover, an idea of the degree of innervation required for muscle contraction is needed in this case. In their opinion, the nerve current that flows from the motor center to the motor nerve during discharge gives rise to a sensation sui generis (peculiar), different from all other sensations. The latter are connected with the movements of centripetal currents, while the feeling of innervation is connected with centrifugal currents, and not a single movement is mentally anticipated by us without this feeling preceding it. The innervation feeling indicates, as it were, the degree of force with which a given movement must be carried out, and the effort with which it is most convenient to carry it out. But many psychologists reject the existence of the innervation feeling, and of course they are right, since no solid arguments can be made in favor of its existence.
The varying degrees of effort we actually experience when we make the same movement, but in relation to objects of unequal resistance, are all due to centripetal currents from our chest, jaws, abdomen and other parts of the body in which sympathetic contractions take place. muscles when the effort we are exerting is great. In this case, there is no need to be aware of the degree of innervation of the centrifugal current. Through self-observation, we are convinced only that in this case the degree of required tension is completely determined by us with the help of centripetal currents coming from the muscles themselves, from their attachments, from adjacent joints and from the general tension of the pharynx, chest and whole body. When we imagine a certain degree of tension, this complex aggregate of sensations associated with centripetal currents, constituting the object of our consciousness, in a precise and distinct way indicates to us exactly with what force we must produce this movement and how great the resistance that we need to overcome.
Let the reader try to direct his will to a certain movement and try to notice what this direction consisted of. Was there anything other than a representation of the sensations he would experience when he made the given movement? If we mentally isolate these sensations from the field of our consciousness, will we still have at our disposal any sensible sign, device or guiding means by which the will could innervate the proper muscles with the right degree of intensity, without directing the current randomly into any muscles? ? Isolate these sensations that precede the final result of the movement, and instead of getting a series of ideas about the directions in which our will can direct the current, you will have an absolute void in the mind, it will be filled with no content. If I want to write Peter and not Paul, then the movements of my pen are preceded by thoughts of some sensations in my fingers, some sounds, some signs on paper — and nothing more. If I want to pronounce Paul, and not Peter, then the pronunciation is preceded by thoughts about the sounds of my voice that I hear and about some muscular sensations in the tongue, lips and throat. All these sensations are connected with centripetal currents; between the thought of these sensations, which gives the act of will the possible certainty and completeness, and the act itself, there is no place for any third kind of mental phenomena.
The composition of the act of will includes a certain element of consent to the fact that the act is carried out — the decision «let it be!». And for me, and for the reader, without a doubt, it is this element that characterizes the essence of the volitional act. Below we will take a closer look at what the “so be it!” solution is. For the present moment we can leave it aside, since it is included in all acts of the will and therefore does not indicate the differences that can be established between them. No one will argue that when moving, for example, with the right hand or with the left, it is qualitatively different.
Thus, by self-observation, we have found that the mental state preceding the movement consists only in the pre-movement ideas about the sensations that it will entail, plus (in some cases) the command of the will, according to which the movement and the sensations associated with it should be carried out; there is no reason to assume the existence of special sensations associated with centrifugal nerve currents.
Thus, the entire content of our consciousness, all the material that composes it — the sensations of movement, as well as all other sensations — are apparently of peripheral origin and penetrate into the area of our consciousness primarily through the peripheral nerves.
The ultimate reason to move
Let us call that idea in our consciousness that directly precedes the motor discharge the final cause for movement. The question is: do only immediate motor ideas serve as reasons for movement, or can they also be mediated motor ideas? There can be no doubt that both immediate and mediated motor ideas can be the final cause for movement. Although at the beginning of our acquaintance with a certain movement, when we are still learning to produce it, direct motor ideas come to the fore in our consciousness, but later this is not the case.
Generally speaking, it can be considered as a rule that with the passage of time, immediate motor ideas more and more recede into the background in consciousness, and the more we learn to produce some kind of movement, the more often mediated motor ideas are the final cause for it. In the area of our consciousness, the ideas that interest us most play a dominant role; we strive to get rid of everything else as soon as possible. But, generally speaking, immediate motor ideas are of no essential interest. We are mainly interested in the goals towards which our movement is directed. These goals are, for the most part, indirect sensations associated with the impressions that a given movement causes in the eye, in the ear, sometimes on the skin, in the nose, in the palate. If we now assume that the presentation of one of these goals was firmly associated with the corresponding nervous discharge, then it turns out that the thought of the immediate effects of innervation will be an element that delays the execution of an act of will just as much as that feeling of innervation, which we are talking about above. Our consciousness does not need this thought, for it is enough to imagine the ultimate goal of the movement.
Thus the idea of purpose tends to take more and more possession of the realm of consciousness. In any case, if kinesthetic ideas do arise, they are so absorbed in the living kinesthetic sensations that immediately overtake them that we are not aware of their independent existence. When I write, I am not previously aware of the sight of the letters and the muscular tension in my fingers as something separate from the sensations of the movement of my pen. Before I write a word, I hear it as if it were sounding in my ears, but there is no corresponding visual or motor image reproduced. This happens due to the speed with which the movements follow their mental motives. Recognizing a certain goal to be achieved, we immediately innervate the center associated with the first movement necessary for its implementation, and then the rest of the chain of movements is performed as if reflexively (see p. 47).
The reader will, of course, agree that these considerations are quite valid in regard to quick and decisive acts of will. In them, only at the very beginning of the action do we resort to a special decision of the will. A man says to himself: «We must change clothes» — and immediately involuntarily takes off his frock coat, his fingers in the usual way begin to unbutton the buttons of the waistcoat, etc.; or, for example, we say to ourselves: “We need to go downstairs” — and immediately get up, go, take hold of the door handle, etc., guided solely by the idea of uXNUMXbuXNUMXbthe goal associated with a series of successively arising sensations leading directly to it.
Apparently, we must assume that we, striving for a certain goal, introduce inaccuracy and uncertainty into our movements when we focus our attention on the sensations associated with them. We are the better able, for example, to walk on a log, the less we pay attention to the position of our legs. We throw, catch, shoot and hit more accurately when visual (mediated) rather than tactile and motor (direct) sensations predominate in our minds. Direct our eyes to the target, and the hand itself will deliver the object you throw to the target, focus on the movements of the hand — and you will not hit the target. Southgard found that he could more accurately determine the position of a small object by touch with the tip of a pencil by means of visual than by means of tactile motives for movement. In the first case, he looked at a small object and, before touching it with a pencil, closed his eyes. In the second, he put the object on the table with his eyes closed and then, moving his hand away from it, tried to touch it again. The average errors (if we consider only the experiments with the most favorable results) were 17,13 mm in the second case and only 12,37 mm in the first (for vision). These conclusions are obtained by self-observation. By what physiological mechanism the described actions are performed is unknown.
In Chapter XIX we saw how great is the variety in the ways of reproduction in different individuals. In persons belonging to the «tactile» (according to the expression of French psychologists) type of reproduction, kinesthetic ideas probably play a more prominent role than I have indicated. In general, we should not expect too much uniformity in this respect among different individuals and argue about which of them is a typical representative of a given mental phenomenon.
I hope I have now clarified what is the motor idea that must precede the movement and determine its voluntary character. It is not the thought of the innervation necessary to produce a given movement. It is a mental anticipation of sensory impressions (direct or indirect — sometimes a long series of actions) that will be the result of a given movement. This mental anticipation determines at least what they will be. So far I have argued as if it also determined that a given move would be made. Undoubtedly, many readers will not agree with this, because often in volitional acts, apparently, it is necessary to add to the mental anticipation of a movement a special decision of the will, its consent to the movement being made. This decision of the will I have hitherto left aside; its analysis will constitute the second important point of our study.
Ideomotor action
We have to answer the question, can the idea of its sensible results in itself serve as a sufficient reason for the movement before the onset of the movement, or should the movement still be preceded by some additional mental element in the form of a decision, consent, command of the will, or another similar state of consciousness? I give the following answer. Sometimes such an idea is sufficient, but sometimes the intervention of an additional mental element is necessary in the form of a special decision or command of the will that precedes the movement. In most cases, in the simplest acts, this decision of the will is absent. Cases of a more complex character will be considered in detail by us later.
Now let us turn to a typical example of volitional action, the so-called ideomotor action, in which the thought of movement causes the latter directly, without a special decision of the will. Every time we immediately, without hesitation, perform it at the thought of movement, we perform an ideomotor action. In this case, between the thought of movement and its realization, we are not aware of anything intermediate. Of course, during this period of time, various physiological processes take place in the nerves and muscles, but we are absolutely not aware of them. We have just had time to think about the action as we have already performed it — that’s all that self-observation gives us here. Carpenter, who first used (as far as I know) the expression «ideomotor action», referred it, if I am not mistaken, to the number of rare mental phenomena. In fact, this is just a normal mental process, not masked by any extraneous phenomena. During a conversation, I notice a pin on the floor or dust on my sleeve. Without interrupting the conversation, I pick up a pin or dust off. No decisions arise in me about these actions, they are performed simply under the impression of a certain perception and a motor idea rushing through the mind.
I act in the same way when, sitting at the table, from time to time I stretch out my hand to the plate in front of me, take a nut or a bunch of grapes and eat. I have already finished dinner, and in the heat of the afternoon conversation I am not aware of what I am doing, but the sight of nuts or berries and the fleeting thought of the possibility of taking them, apparently fatally, causes certain actions in me. In this case, of course, the actions are not preceded by any special decision of the will, just as in all the habitual actions with which every hour of our life is full and which are caused in us by impressions inflowing from outside with such speed that it is often difficult for us to decide whether to attribute this or that similar action to the number of reflex or arbitrary acts. According to Lotze, we see
“when we write or play the piano, that many very complex movements quickly replace one another; each of the motives that evoke these movements in us is realized by us for no more than a second; this interval of time is too short to evoke in us any volitional acts, except for the general desire to produce successively one after the other movements corresponding to those mental reasons for them that so quickly replace each other in our consciousness. In this way we carry out all our daily activities. When we stand, walk, talk, we do not need any special decision of the will for each individual action: we perform them, guided only by the course of our thoughts” (“Medizinische Psychologie”).
In all these cases, we seem to act without stopping, without hesitation in the absence of an opposing idea in our minds. Either there is nothing in our consciousness but the final reason for movement, or there is something that does not interfere with our actions. We know what it is like to get out of bed on a frosty morning in an unheated room: our very nature revolts against such a painful ordeal. Many probably lie in bed for an hour every morning before forcing themselves to get up. We think when we lie down, how late we get up, how the duties that we have to fulfill during the day will suffer from this; we say to ourselves: This is the devil knows what it is! I must finally get up!” — etc. But a warm bed attracts us too much, and we again delay the onset of an unpleasant moment.
How do we get up under such conditions? If I am allowed to judge others by personal experience, then I will say that for the most part we rise in such cases without any internal struggle, without recourse to any decisions of the will. We suddenly find ourselves already out of bed; forgetting about heat and cold, we half-drowse conjure up in our imagination various ideas that have something to do with the coming day; suddenly a thought flashed among them: “Basta, it’s enough to lie!” At the same time, no opposing consideration arose — and immediately we make movements corresponding to our thought. Being vividly aware of the opposite of sensations of heat and cold, we thus aroused in ourselves an indecision that paralyzed our actions, and the desire to get out of bed remained in us a simple desire, without turning into desire. As soon as the idea holding back the action was eliminated, the original idea (of the need to get up) immediately caused the corresponding movements.
This case, it seems to me, contains in miniature all the basic elements of the psychology of desire. Indeed, the whole doctrine of the will developed in this work is, in essence, substantiated by me on a discussion of facts drawn from personal self-observation: these facts convinced me of the truth of my conclusions, and therefore I consider it superfluous to illustrate the above provisions with any other examples. The evidence of my conclusions was undermined, apparently, only by the fact that many motor ideas are not accompanied by corresponding actions. But, as we shall see below, in all, without exception, such cases, simultaneously with a given motor idea, there is in consciousness some other idea that paralyzes the activity of the first one. But even when the action is not completed completely due to delay, it is nevertheless performed in part. Here is what Lotze says about this:
“Following billiard players or looking at fencers, we make weak analogous movements with our hands; poorly educated people, talking about something, constantly gesticulate; reading with interest a lively description of some battle, we feel a slight tremor from the entire muscular system, as if we were present at the events described. The more vividly we begin to imagine movements, the more noticeable the influence of motor ideas on our muscular system begins to be revealed; it weakens to the extent that a complex set of extraneous ideas, filling the area of our consciousness, displaces from it those motor images that began to pass into external acts. “Reading thoughts,” which has become so fashionable lately, is in essence guessing thoughts from muscle contractions: under the influence of motor ideas, we sometimes produce corresponding muscle contractions against our will.
Thus, we can consider the following proposition to be quite reliable. Every representation of movement causes to a certain extent a corresponding movement, which manifests itself most sharply when it is not delayed by any other representation that is simultaneously with the first in the field of our consciousness.
The special decision of the will, its consent to the movement being made, appears when the retarding influence of this last representation must be eliminated. But the reader can now see that in all the simpler cases there is no need for this solution. <...> Movement is not some special dynamic element that must be added to the sensation or thought that has arisen in our consciousness. Every sensory impression that we perceive is associated with a certain excitation of nervous activity, which must inevitably be followed by a certain movement. Our sensations and thoughts are, so to speak, the points of intersection of nerve currents, the end result of which is movement and which, having barely had time to arise in one nerve, already cross into another. Walking opinion; that consciousness is not essentially a preliminary to action, but that the latter must be the result of our “power of will,” is a natural characteristic of that particular case when we think about a certain act for an indefinitely long period of time without carrying it out. But this particular case is not the general norm; here the arrest of the act is carried out by an opposing current of thoughts.
When the delay is eliminated, we feel inner relief — this is that additional impulse, that decision of the will, thanks to which the act of will is performed. In thinking — of a higher order, such processes are constantly taking place. Where this process does not exist, thought and motor discharge usually follow each other continuously, without any intermediate mental act. Movement is a natural result of a sensory process, regardless of its qualitative content, both in the case of a reflex, and in the external manifestation of emotion, and in volitional activity.
Thus, ideomotor action is not an exceptional phenomenon, the significance of which would have to be underestimated and for which a special explanation must be sought. It fits under the general type of conscious actions, and we must take it as a starting point for explaining those actions that are preceded by a special decision of the will. I note that the arrest of the movement, as well as the execution, does not require special effort or command of the will. But sometimes a special volitional effort is needed both to arrest and to perform an action. In the simplest cases, the presence of a known idea in the mind can cause movement, the presence of another idea can delay it. Straighten your finger and at the same time try to think that you are bending it. In a minute it will seem to you that he is slightly bent, although there is no noticeable movement in him, since the thought that he is actually motionless was also part of your consciousness. Get it out of your head, just think about the movement of your finger — instantly without any effort it is already done by you.
Thus, the behavior of a person during wakefulness is the result of two opposing nerve forces. Some unimaginably weak nerve currents, running through the brain cells and fibers, excite the motor centers; other equally weak currents intervene in the activity of the former: sometimes delaying, sometimes intensifying them, changing their speed and direction. In the end, all these currents must sooner or later be passed through certain motor centers, and the whole question is which ones: in one case they pass through one, in the other — through other motor centers, in the third they balance each other for so long. another, that to an outside observer it seems as if they do not pass through the motor centers at all. However, we must not forget that from the point of view of physiology, a gesture, a shift of the eyebrows, a sigh are the same movements as the movement of the body. A change in the countenance of a king can sometimes produce on a subject as shocking an effect as a mortal blow; and our outward movements, which are the result of the nervous currents that accompany the amazing weightless flow of our ideas, must not necessarily be abrupt and impetuous, must not be conspicuous by their gooey character.
Deliberate Action
Now we can begin to find out what happens in us when we act deliberately or when there are several objects in front of our consciousness in the form of opposing or equally favorable alternatives. One of the objects of thought may be a motor idea. By itself, it would cause movement, but some objects of thought at a given moment delay it, while others, on the contrary, contribute to its implementation. The result is a kind of inner feeling of restlessness called indecision. Fortunately, it is too familiar to everyone, but it is completely impossible to describe it.
As long as it continues and our attention fluctuates between several objects of thought, we, as they say, ponder: when, finally, the initial desire for movement gains the upper hand or is finally suppressed by the opposing elements of thought, then we decide whether to make this or that volitional decision. The objects of thought that delay or favor the final action are called reasons or motives for the given decision.
The process of thinking is infinitely complicated. At every moment of it, our consciousness is an extremely complex complex of motives interacting with each other. We are somewhat vaguely aware of the totality of this complex object, now some parts of it, then others come to the fore, depending on changes in the direction of our attention and on the «associative flow» of our ideas. But no matter how sharply the dominant motives appear before us and no matter how close the onset of a motor discharge under their influence, the dimly conscious objects of thought, which are in the background and form what we called above psychic overtones (see Chapter XI), delay action as long as our indecision lasts. It can drag on for weeks, even months, at times taking over our minds.
The motives for action, which only yesterday seemed so bright and convincing, today already seem pale, devoid of liveliness. But neither today nor tomorrow the action is performed by us. Something tells us that all this does not play a decisive role; that motives that seemed weak will be strengthened, and supposedly strong ones will lose all meaning; that we have not yet reached a final balance between motives, that we must now weigh them without giving preference to any of them, and wait as patiently as possible until the final decision matures in our minds. This fluctuation between two alternatives possible in the future resembles the fluctuation of a material body within its elasticity: there is an internal tension in the body, but no external rupture. Such a state can continue indefinitely both in the physical body and in our consciousness. If the action of elasticity has ceased, if the dam is broken and the nerve currents quickly penetrate the cerebral cortex, the oscillations cease and a solution occurs.
Decisiveness can manifest itself in a variety of ways. I will try to give a concise description of the most typical types of determination, but I will describe mental phenomena gleaned only from personal self-observation. The question of what causality, spiritual or material, governs these phenomena will be discussed below.
Five main types of determination
William James distinguished five main types of determination: reasonable, random, impulsive, personal, strong-willed. See →
The existence of such a mental phenomenon as a feeling of effort should by no means be denied or questioned. But in assessing its significance, great disagreements prevail. The solution of such important questions as the very existence of spiritual causality, the problem of free will and universal determinism is connected with the clarification of its meaning. In view of this, we need to examine especially carefully those conditions under which we experience a sense of volitional effort.
A sense of effort
When I stated that consciousness (or the nervous processes associated with it) are impulsive in nature, I should have added: with a sufficient degree of intensity. States of consciousness differ in their ability to cause movement. The intensity of some sensations in practice is powerless to cause noticeable movements, the intensity of others entails visible movements. When I say ‘in practice’ I mean ‘under ordinary conditions’. Such conditions may be habitual stops in activity, for example, the pleasant feeling of doice far niente (the sweet feeling of doing nothing), which causes in each of us a certain degree of laziness, which can only be overcome with the help of an energetic effort of the will; such is the feeling of innate inertia, the feeling of internal resistance exerted by the nerve centers, a resistance which makes discharge impossible until the acting force has reached a certain degree of tension and has not gone beyond it.
These conditions are different in different persons and in the same person at different times. The inertia of the nerve centers can either increase or decrease, and, accordingly, the habitual delays in action either increase or weaken. Along with this, the intensity of some processes of thought and stimuli must change, and certain associative paths become either more or less traversable. From this it is clear why the ability to evoke an impulse to action in some motives is so variable in comparison with others. When the motives that act weaker under normal conditions become stronger acting, and the motives that act more strongly under normal conditions begin to act weaker, then actions that are usually performed without effort, or refraining from an action that is usually not associated with labor, become impossible or are performed only at the expense of effort (if at all committed in a similar situation). This will become clear in a more detailed analysis of the feeling of effort.