Centro de transformación

The natural philosophy of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and the natural history of the eighteenth had by the end of the Victorian period transformed into a form of science much more recognizable to modern eyes. While the names and methodologies changed, the aims did not. Natural philosophy sought to describe and explain the entire system of the world, and late-nineteenth century science was no

26 _{Theodore Porter, ‘Statistical Utopianism in an Age of Aristocratic Efficiency’, Osiris 17 (2002), p.} 211.

27 _{Richard Yeo, ‘Science and Intellectual Authority in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Britain: Robert} Chambers and “Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation”’, Victorian Studies 28 (1984), p. 24. 28 _{Gauld, Founders, p. 27.}

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different.29 This development had not been a constant and linear progression

independent of the complex cultural changes that were taking place, but was intricately intertwined with them. The dilution of mainstream religion, the rise of Spiritualism, increasing socialism and feminism, and the excess of gothic literature was accompanied by the professionalization of science and the formalization of science education.

Underpinning scientific endeavours at this time were overarching debates about scientific method, which could be considered as a crystallization of Asprem’s notion of disenchantment. The preeminent theorists of the period were the polymaths

John Herschel (1792-1871) and William Whewell (1794-1866),30 and John Stuart

Mill. Each of these noted intellectuals argued the merits of the two main opposing methodologies – inductive reasoning and deductive reasoning – with the former

presented more often as having intellectual authority over the latter at this time.31 The

inductive method, heavily reliant on the empiricist works of Sir Francis Bacon (1561- 1626), with the gravitational mechanics and optics of Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) providing practical examples, sought to develop universal inferences from specific observations. ‘On the subject of induction,’ declared Mill, ‘the task to be performed was that of generalizing modes investigating truth and estimating evidence, by which so many important and recondite laws of nature have, in the various sciences, been

aggregated to the stock of human knowledge.’32 _{It was the inductive methodology}

which was promoted by the SPR, evident by its voluminous data gathering and collation, with theories being developed only as a result of its analysis. Deductive reasoning is the methodological opposite of induction, working from a general hypothesis to predict specific observations. The disputes arising from these polarized methodologies were highlighted best by the field of optics. The dominant particle theory of light could only be supported by inductive reasoning, with reference to larger observable physical bodies. The opposing wave, or undulatory theory of light

29 _{John Henry, The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science (Basingstoke: Palgrave,} 1997; repr. 2008, Kindle Edition), p. 4.

30 _{Gauld, Founders, p. 41. There are academic and social links between Whewell and Sidgwick, with} the former being master of Trinity College, Cambridge, between 1841 and 1846. Additionally, he was Myers’ uncle, through marriage to his mother Susan Marshall’s sister, Cordelia.

31 _{David L. Hull, ‘Darwin’s Science and Victorian Philosophy of Science’, in Cambridge Companion}

to Darwin, ed. by Jonathan Hodge and Gregory Radick (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp. 169-170.

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could not be defended in this way, as it proposed a concept of light waves operating within an invisible and intangible, yet all-pervasive medium. The wave theory was initially considered as little more than speculation, but its predictive success raised the

problem of standards (induction) versus achievements (hypothesis).33

Herschel, Whewell, and Mill each highlighted the pre-eminence of the bottom- up logic of direct observations over the top-down logic of hypotheses in their main

works, yet none of them dismissed the latter. Herschel, in his Preliminary Discourse

on the Study of Natural Philosophy (1830), suggested the possibility of an alternating approach between inductive and deductive reasoning, but presented no cohesive

compromise between the two.34 In Whewell’s Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences

(1840), he attempted a reconciliation through his ‘consilience of inductions’. He posited that one successful causal explanatory theory regarding one set of phenomena, was able to provide an equally successful causal explanation of another group of

phenomena, different from original expectations.35 Mill’s Logic further reinforced the

distinction between inductions and hypotheses, suggesting that while there was a place for deductive reasoning, it was not to be used for the validation of genuine

science, which had to derive from observable evidence alone.36 Their common goal

was that of identifying a vera causa, or true cause, of observed phenomena. This was

very much the aspiration of the early psychical researchers of the SPR, regardless of how unusual paranormal phenomena appeared to be. While Herschel regarded experience as fundamental to physical investigation, he conceded that some

phenomena were of too extreme a scale to be experienced directly, and agreed with Whewell that being able to infer unexpected phenomena from a pre-existing theory

was acceptable. Whewell even suggested that while vera causa were imperative, they

need not necessarily be validated by direct experience. This view permitted the existence of theories which didn’t require a physical causal system, such as the wave theory of optics, the concept of ether, and even supernatural influences. Consideration of God and the supernatural was not uncommon in scientific works at this time, with many arguing that true science validated religion by supporting Christian faith in a

33 _{Hull, ‘Darwin’s Science’, pp. 170-171.} 34 _{Ibid., p. 171.}

35 _{Menachem Fisch, ‘Whewell's Consilience of Inductions – An Evaluation’, Philosophy of Science 52} (1985), pp. 239-240.

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practical way.37 Without the requirement for such a physical causal system, the

members of the SPR were able to speculate upon and consider immaterial and

spiritual notions without transgressing generally accepted scientific methodology, and so paranormal phenomena could be validly investigated within a wider intellectual framework. I will show that this all-inclusive approach was very much advocated by the key early psychical researchers, and links directly to the specific characteristics of inclusivity of the material and immaterial within the mode of thinking and the use of scientific method, albeit intentionally eclectic, within the mode of doing of the paranormal domain.