CHAPTER IX

THE RELATION BETWEEN THE TENDENCIES



It would seem that the negative tendency depends

for its possibility on certain special combinations of

position taking place, which combinations would probably

take place anyway by accident, but which would be much

more likely to happen as a result of other similar

combinations. In other words, if we take the negative

tendency, we will find that any "negative" event must

have been immediately preceded by an extremely improbable

sort of combination, but is followed by a more probable

combination. This can be seen if we take the simplest

example of the negative tendency, the super-elastic

collision, which, in order, to happen at all, must be

preceded by a rather unlikely sort of concentration

of particles and energy at the exact point of collision.

This does not in the least contradict our conclusion that

the positive and negative tendencies are equally probable;

for, on analysing the positive tendency, we find that it

is followed by a similarly improbable condition. Thus, in

the negative tendency, the cause is where the improbable

stage comes in, but in the positive tendency, that same

improbable stage cornea in at the effect. However, the two

varieties of "improbable stage" do not correspond exactly;

for that of the negative tendency consists in a concentration

of motion, while that of the positive tendency consists of a

divergence of motion. Hence the effect of a positive event

could hardly serve as the starting-point for a negative event.

Outside of some accidental combination, a negative event

must have a negative combination for at least part of the

cause. The reverse of this rule is, that a positive event must

give rise to positive effects, at least partially.

In other words, we have such things as a negative or a

positive event giving rise to another event of its own kind;

but with only positive causes, a negative result would hardly

be expected to arise. If we identify the negative tendency with

life, the statement reduces to this: All life comes from some

living cause.

On the contrary, there is no such improbability in a purely

negative cause giving rise to positive effects. In fact, as we

have seen, a positive universe could not have existed for

an infinite time past, nor a negative universe for an infinite

time in the future; in either kind of universe, the change

from negative cause to positive effect must take place; in

fact, it is to be expected that it will be very common for a

negative cause to give rise to a positive effect.

We thus see that the transformation from positive to

negative takes place in a very different way from the change

from negative to positive. The latter can take place as a

comparatively sudden transformation, a sudden cessation

of all life activity; while non-living bodies cannot become

alive except by accretion on other living bodies. The

transformation from positive to negative can occur only as an

extension of the negative tendency from some sort of center

that is already negative; that is, by a living body growing.

It might be supposed that this difference between one

kind of transformation and its inverse indicates an

irreversible law; and we have already seen that, if we give

up the second law of thermodynamics, we must replace it by

the statement that all physical lows are reversible. Hence it

would seem as though we had arrived at an inconsistency.

But, if we examine into the question, we will see that one form

of transformation is not the actual reverse of the other, but that

each process is symmetrical in time, and is really the reverse

of itself. For the transformation, for instance, of a negative

cause into a positive effect suddenly and completely, is

a strictly reversible one, if we consider the fact that a negative

cause corresponds in the reverse universe to a positive effect,

and vice versa; so that, when in the real universe we have a

negative cause and a positive effect, we will have the same in

the reverse universe, so that the process remains unchanged

when reversed. The same is true of the other process, by which

a positive cause might give a negative effect.

However, in the latter case, there is a different element,

whose reverse is not quite identical with itself, and therefore

whose reverse can be used to supplement lite proposition.

That is to say, where such a transformation must, as we have

seen, require some negative element to enter into the cause,

the reverse of this requires some positive element to enter into

the effect. That is, such a transformation not only cannot be

spontaneous, but it also cannot be complete. If a positive

substance be absorbed into a negative body, some positive

matter must, at the end of the process, be rejected.

In other words, we come to the following conclusions;

(1) Life cannot generate spontaneously, except by an accident

that is so' extremely unlikely that it would hardly happen once in

a whole universe; (2) life extends to new matter by a process of

growth, that is, by accretion round a living center; (3) where a

living body absorbs inanimate mailer, some inanimate matter

must be rejected; (4) however, the transformation of living into

lifeless matter may take place suddenly and completely,

manifesting merely a sudden cessation of life-activities, a

cessation which would be an irreparable one.