Passage 1
The parallel is the more striking since it has long been known with regard to animal tissues that the same drug, administered in large or small doses, might have opposite effects, and in preceding chapters we have seen that the same statement holds good of plants and metals also. #Stimulus of light.#--Even the responses of such a highly specialised organ as the retina are strictly paralleled by inorganic responses. We have seen how the stimulus of light evokes in the artificial retina responses which coincide in all their detail with those produced in the real retina. This was seen in ineffective stimuli becoming effective after repetition, in the relation between stimulus and response, and in the effects produced by temperature; also in the phenomenon of after-oscillation. These similarities went even further, the very abnormalities of retinal response finding their reflection in the inorganic.
Free will and automatismlife is not mechanism · rejectsScientific or empirical evidenceNo judgment offered
Bose argues from experimental parallels between animal, plant, metal, and artificial-retina responses. The passage rejects the need for a special vital force, but it does not directly evaluate human autonomy or agency.
Local word range 41891–42315